Helpless a Last Sacrifice Dimose fic
by jajenshadimose6012
Summary: This is a Last Sacrifice Dimose Dimitri/Rose fic based on the BTVS ep. "Helpless". Rose is stripped of her strength and skill and then trapped in a room with Strigoi-she has to manage to fight her way out without her guardian abilities.
1. Chapter 1

"Okay," I grunted, folding my body up into yet another sit-up, forcing myself to ignore the familiar burning pain in my abdomen. "500 more to go. 2,010," I continued counting off as my back once again collided with the floor of my jail cell. With another grunt, I lurched myself into another sit-up. "2,011." I let out a small cry of protest as my back made contact with the floor this time.

I gasped desperately for breath as I threw myself into yet another sit-up. "Ah, the hell with it; Dimitri's not here to call me on this shit," I practically growled. My back hit the floor. "What he don't know won't hurt him. 2,499." The smugness was evident in my voice, even through the pain, and I felt the slightest sense of triumph at having been able to best him for once since he wasn't here to scold me for not doing it _his_ way.

"2,500—" Gathering every ounce of strength I could muster, I was able to force myself to sit myself up all the way—just barely—before my back slammed hard against the floor.

This time, I didn't get back up. I was lying there for a long moment afterward, recovering from the ordeal I had just put myself through. Sweat coated my skin and my chest rose and fell rapidly with each forced, painful breath I took.

God, my whole body just ached so badly. I never put myself through so much agony of my own free will before. Usually, I only did it because I had a stern, hard-core Dimitri there to bitch me out for slacking off—should I ever. _That_ was enough motivation to make God, Himself want to step up His game a couple notches.

"Hathaway," a familiar voice barked, startling me, my guardian instincts making me jerk upright.

The sudden movement sent a fiery pain surging through my body, my muscles screaming at me in protest for what I had just put them through. Son of a _bitch_—that hurt so fucking much. My hand went over to clutch the side of my neck, and I began lightly massaging out the kinks in it.

I didn't want to let on to how much pain I was actually in. I had a reputation as one of the toughest, most bad-ass guardians out there and no way was I going to ruin _that_ reputation now by showing even the slightest hint of weakness. I had been through way worse pain than this before, no doubt. I had to maintain my strong suit so I carefully composed my face into the guardian mask I had spent the past couple months honing up. It took me forever, but I had finally mastered that particular skill and I was pretty damn proud of myself for it.

With an internal groan, I allowed my gaze to drift up only to be met with the disapproving glare of the main guardian that had arrested me. He was accompanied by about 10-12 other guardians, which was to be expected. A little extravagant, considering I was behind bars and couldn't lash out at them even if I—well, I _did_ want to…but that was beside the point at the moment.

A couple of them I recognized as some of the guardians Dimitri had tossed around when he tried to stop them from taking me. A couple I knew by name. But, for the most part, I kept my eyes locked on the main one that had arrested me, considering the glare he continued to give me.

Working to keep my smirk hidden, I managed to play it off quite well as the nonchalant, flippant teenager who didn't give a crap what they did to me. Years and years of practice really helped to keep it convincing, even to me.

"And, hello to you too, my fellow guardians," I acknowledged, with a feigned politeness. Unfortunately, I never did happen to catch the guy's name so my smart-ass comments didn't have quite the efficiency they usually did. "What an unpleasant surprise," I continued, with the most pleasant smile I could muster. "To what do I owe the great annoyance?"

He was clearly not amused, judging by the look on his face. He just stared at me, unblinking. "You're free to go," he said, deadpan. "You're being released," he further clarified.

I shot up excitedly with those words, rising to my feet with a speed that surprised even myself. "What, are you serious? Just like that, I'm being released? No more: 'Crappy salad or crappy dry pasta'; no more: 'crappy cot or in ball on the floor'? A decent meal? My own bed? Oh, dear God…" My gaze drifted upward admirably, as if I was praying. "…you really do love me after all."

"Enough!" he retorted, with a sigh and an eye roll, as he detached his keys from his hip and began unlocking the gate. "Apparently, Mr. _Mazur_," he practically snarled the name in disgust. "…pulled you quite a few favors and turns out, we _don't_ have enough to hold you in custody. Not yet, anyway," he added, narrowing his eyes at me in suspicion and definite distrust.

Not that I gave a damn what he thought of me; I had seen that look way too many times in my life to actually care about it.

I gave a careless shrug. "Well, thank God it's not _yet_ yet, huh?" I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm, but managing to sound somewhat sincere to someone who might not have known me.

Keeping his eyes locked on mine, he swung the door to the side, but held out a hand to stop me from going any further. I considered shoving it out of my way and charging on past him, but decided against it. Better to just give the man his two cents and let him do what he has to do to feel important, I guess. Plus, if he had something to say to me—with all these guardians here—chances are I wouldn't make it two steps before I would be restrained and forced to hear him out.

"Don't push it," he warned, the message in his eyes only too clear. "One mistake, Hathaway, that is all it takes. _One_ more slip-up from you…and I get to toss your ass back in here. Are we clear?"

"Don't do me any favors," I returned.

"I wouldn't dream of doing you a favor after what you did," he said, sounding utterly repulsed by me. "We might not have enough to put you away just yet, but everyone knows you did it. I don't need those 11 votes to know in every fiber of my being that you did it. And, even if Mazur can save you from prison, I guarantee you, he cannot save you from everything." He leaned in closer to whisper his next words. "There are other methods that prove just as efficient as jail for treasonous traitors such as yourself. And, I will do everything in my power to ensure those very methods are called upon if it comes down to it. Do you understand?"

I managed a small chuckle, making him step back to look at me again, looking appalled at my approach to his threats. "I believe you are the one who misunderstands," I corrected. "You see, you can do whatever you want to me. Lock me up, kill me, anything. But, the truth is going to come out sooner or later. And, when it does, everyone will know I'm innocent…" I now leaned in to whisper my next words to him. "…and you'll be the one who has to live with the guilt."

He jerked away from me abruptly, as if I had just told him I had a contagious disease that he would catch from being in the mere vicinity of me. "I feel no guilt whatsoever over the elimination of murderers in my society, Miss Hathaway."

"And innocents?" I challenged. "What about them? Any guilt over the elimination of them?"

"You are the farthest thing from innocent, Hathaway," he spat.

"Morally speaking—" I gave another shrug, along with a slight smirk. "—you're absolutely right. Morality and I are mortal enemies, in a constant fight-to-the-death battle; it's quite aggravating. Legally speaking, however—" Well, I wasn't exactly innocent in that particular aspect either, but I wasn't about to cop to that. "—I am in no way guilty. Of what; calling the queen a sanctimonious bitch? Well, I'm sorry, but she had her moments. Call 'em as I see 'em and I'm calling it. That does not mean I killed her and you have no right making that kind of assumption. I'm already an ass, but why would you really wanna make yourself one?"

He made to advance towards me, but stopped himself when he realized I wasn't posing an actual threat at the moment. I was just pissing him off—that didn't exactly justify trying to take me down.

"No assumptions were made whatsoever," he pointed out. "Everything in that court room was backed up with hard proof, with hard facts. You have nothing. You have your word—something that has always been quite unreliable—and you have the word of those closest to you. And, love has a frequent tendency of blinding people."

I snorted. "Well, in case you haven't noticed, I'm not too fond of you either, buddy."

"You really have no idea, do you?" He shook his head as he continued glaring at me. "No one can help you. No one will. Anyone who believes you can't do a thing for you. Princess Vasilisa, her lapdog—the Ozera boy—Adrian Ivashkov. That boy's been unstable as long as I've known him; he is easily influenced by anything that revolves around you. And, Belikov…"

He grimaced slightly at the mention of Dimitri. Not everyone had taken to Dimitri since his return—some feared it was a trick or that it was only a matter of time before he changed back or lashed out and tried to massacre us all—and this guardian happened to fall under that particular category.

"Ever since he came back," he began, "he hasn't been right. Hardly noticeable, sure, but it _is_ there. No one is ever going to believe the ex-Strigoi-turned-dhampir. Nothing he says will be taken seriously; you have to know that. Matter of fact, he probably would've just been better off dead. Either that or he should've just remained a Strigoi because now, he's completely ruined. Now, he's nothing. He can never be—he's not good, he's not evil, he just…is. That, Hathaway, that is why we kill Strigoi. We don't play the hero of the piece and try to save them, because there is no saving them. Not really."

"Well, you're right about one thing," I agreed, using every ounce of strength I had to not start swinging right here and now for his comment about Dimitri. Hardly anyone knew about our past relationship here and I wanted to keep it that way. It was none of their business and I had no intentions of making it their business. "We don't play the hero of the piece," I repeated his words and glared at him with my next ones. "Because you could never be the hero of _any_ piece."

"Mm, that so?" he asked, with a scoff, shaking his head.

"So it is," I said, with a firm nod. "Now, if I am not mistaken, you said I was free to go, which would imply that I am actually free to go. So, this is me going."

I shoved my way past him and made to walk out when I realized that the guardians accompanying him were surrounding me now, blocking the exit and keeping me completely trapped between them and the cell I had been locked in.

Trying to play it off as a joke, I gave a small smile. "Aw, thanks for the offer guys, really, but I feel fairly confident that I can make it back to my room without an escort. I know it's been a while, but I do still remember where it is. Unless of course they went and moved it on me—"

Before I knew what was happening, someone was grabbing me from behind, immediately restraining my arms so that I couldn't struggle. I stifled a gasp right as a needle syringe was plunged into the side of my neck. My already useless attempts to fight back proved to be unsuccessful as my legs gave way beneath me and I collapsed into the guardian's arms.

My eyes rolled into the back of my head and my body fell completely limp. A pair of arms moved down to get a better hold on me before I could actually fall to the floor. Suddenly, my body was being effortlessly hoisted up, the worst of my weight being supported by those strong forearms.

I managed to let out another small cry—even in my semi-unconscious state—that faded off into a weak moan. While my mind was screaming at me to wake up and start fighting, my body's needs took me over. It was only a matter of seconds, if that, before I fell completely under.

And that was it.

With that, I lost myself further in those luring depths of unconsciousness, allowing each wave crashing down upon me to drag me down deeper and deeper…until there was nothing left…


	2. Chapter 2

"Roza," the familiar voice called out to me from the void—the one voice that I would've recognized anywhere, no matter what traumas I had undergone.

And, as always, it was the greatest of comfort to me. His voice was severely distorted, his words slurring. Even so, I latched onto that voice with everything I had—that piece of him being my one and only anchor to reality. All my hope rested on that voice, any chance I had of ever coming back from this oblivion depended entirely on—

"I've given up on you," he spoke again. His words were still somewhat distorted but it was starting to come into focus now. "Love fades." Oh, God. Oh, please God, not this again. I can't, I can't hear this again. I won't. "Mine has." The force of those words hitting me was literally like the getting the wind knocked out of me.

I forced myself not to react to the sudden gut-wrenching agony those words triggered. "Dimitri," I cried out in a small voice. I searched longingly for the source, fighting desperately to come back to myself. No answer. "Where are you?" I demanded, voice hard and bold, frustrated with my lack of an answer.

"Rose, do you think I'd do anything that would hurt you?" Dimitri's voice took a sudden unexpected turn…taking on the coolness and complete lack of emotion that it had…when he was a Strigoi.

Did he really want an honest answer to that question? "Yes, she was," his voice shifted again into another memory, this time taking on the warmth and sense of familiarity of my Dimitri. Of dhampir Dimitri. "Is. And that's why I had to say no. I couldn't return that…couldn't give her what she wanted. Not when…not when my heart is somewhere else." God, that voice, that warmth…it wrapped around me, caressing me—so much so it was as if the words themselves were tangible.

"I've given up on you." That voice took yet another sudden, unexpected turn, returning to square one, repeating once more those words that left me empty. "Love fades. Mine has." The most excruciating of pain surged through me as I listened to the voice—to the _man_—I loved more than anything else in the world tell me again and again that he couldn't love me anymore.

"Didn't I tell you once I'd always be there for you? I'm here. I'll protect you. We're going to be together. We're meant to be together," the cold voice of Strigoi Dimitri spoke again, making my head spin with confusion and delirium.

"I'm not leaving you alone on this, no matter what." Dhampir Dimitri. Warm. Fierce. Loving. Everything I knew, everything I loved. "You know I'd never abandon you."

"What…" I cried out, trying desperately to figure out just what was—

"You're strong—" Oh, God. I absolutely _could not_ hear him say this again. I couldn't, it would completely— "you're so, so strong." I held my breath. "It's why I love you…" I couldn't help the small cry of pain that escaped me with those words. "I love you, Roza…" And, the pain kept coming. "I'll always be here for you. I'm not going to let anything happen to you."

"What the hell is going on here?" I nearly shouted, unable to hear this anymore. It was agony—my heart shattering into a million pieces once again. "Damn it, Dimitri, where are you? What the hell are you doing to me; what are you saying—?"

"I'm saying there's a fire in you that drives everything you do, that makes you need to better the world and those you love…" he immediately cut me off again, both answering my question to a certain extent while also managing to confuse me even further. Remarkable, isn't it? "It's one of the wonderful things about you. One of many…"

His voice dropped off before immediately coming right back in. "I've given up on you." Oh, come on! You have_ got_ to be kidding me! "Love fades. Mine has."

"…and I would never let anything bad happen to you," Strigoi Dimitri promised me. "I'll protect you." That promise meant very little to me now. And, the fact that it came from an evil undead creature of the night (formerly) had absolutely nothing to do with it—though that did factor into the equation a little bit.

"I'd do a lot of things to protect you, Roza." Oh, for the love of God, did he _really_ expect me to go on believing that piece of crap lie he fed me? No way in hell I could ever trust that he would do anything to protect me ever again, no matter what I was up against—

"Don't touch her…" Dimitri's voice growled, but not in a Strigoi way or in a way that made me afraid of him, by any means. It did make me flinch again, however.

This flinch wasn't from the pain I was drowning in, though; this was from the memory itself. This memory was so vivid, so real, it was as if I was literally reliving it. God, I remembered the look in his eyes as clearly as if I was staring at those dark, intense eyes right now. I remembered how protective he was of me and _just _how far he was willing to go, how much he was willing to sacrifice for my sake. "Stay back," he told me, as he shielded me with his body, ready to take on the armies of the world to keep me safe. "They aren't laying a hand on you."

Remembering that, reliving that memory, the intensity and strength of the will with which he fought for me, was enough to nearly make me forget all about the pain and the terrible words that had completely negated the rest. There was no way he didn't care about me, not after all he had done for me. I don't care what he said; I was not going to give in. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that Dimitri Belikov did and always, always would—

"I've given up on you." The words cut into me like a knife. "Love fades." Another cut, much deeper this time…Painfully ripping me apart, tearing violently at my already broken heart. "Mine has…" Oh, God…

"I've given up on you. Love fades. Mine has…"

XXXXXXXXX

"_I've given up on you. Love fades. Mine has…" _were the last words I heard before I finally managed to break through the worst of the unconsciousness.

Of course breaking through that last wave meant I was met with a throbbing in my head, feeling like someone was literally taking a sledgehammer to my skull. And, even worse, the side of my neck felt like it was on fire from where that needle had been plunged into me. An intense, searing fire was coursing through my veins, pounding in my very blood. God, it felt like I was literally being incinerated from the inside out, my body completely obliterating itself.

The softest of whimpers escaped my lips before I could stop it and my eyes fluttered open. A big mistake, as it turns out, since that made the world start spinning at like a million miles an hour. It threatened to drag me back under the dark waters of oblivion yet again.

"God," I groaned, gathering every ounce of strength I could muster to fight through this haze. My head lolled weakly to the side, my eyes fluttering open and shut yet again in my delirium. "Ugh…last time fire was coursing through my veins like this was a lot more pleasant," I noted.

Granted, the last time fire was coursing through my veins like this had been when I had sex with Dimitri. Not to sound distasteful or anything, but hey, it was the truth. Having sex with Dimitri had stirred feelings and emotions in me that I had never even dreamed were possible. It was an absolutely phenomenal experience. It was, without a doubt, the best experience of my life—nothing would ever be able to top that, I was sure of it—

"Rosemarie Hathaway," a cold, calculating voice spoke my name. My head snapped up immediately and I stifled a gasp at who—or rather, _what_ I was met with—

A Strigoi. _Several_ Strigoi, actually—somewhere between seven, maybe eight Strigoi, from what I could see. God only knew how many there actually were; this was just as far as I could tell.

I finally took this moment to assess my situation. Me—tightly bound to a chair in the middle of some old, dingy room…surrounded by Strigoi. That was about all I needed to know at the moment—I didn't need much else to realize just how screwed to hell I was.

I was instantly being smothered by the overwhelming stench of dirt and grime and old, rusty metal. I winced at a sudden clatter sounding in the distance, which made me think we were in an abandoned factory somewhere. Even with my eyes somewhat adjusted now, the room was pretty dark. Well, not exactly _dark_, per se. It wasn't like pitch black to the point where I had to rely on my other senses or anything, but it was very dimly lit. I definitely couldn't make out any of the faces of the Strigoi. Aside from their red eyes and chalk white skin, I wasn't able to distinguish any of their features or any significant differences between them, for that matter.

Dragging my eyes from one Strigoi to another, I searched those soulless, merciless expressions, trying desperately to figure out just what I was up against and what my chances were of getting out of this alive. Further calculation told me…_way_ beyond slim to none. Impossible would probably be a more accurate guess.

Oh, God. The realization just hit me that…I wasn't feeling my usual Strigoi-induced nausea. Usually, that nausea tipped me off to any Strigoi in my presence (or anywhere in the vicinity of me, actually). A great asset when it came to battling the undead admittedly, but not so much of an asset right now. Not so much of an anything right now. It just…wasn't there. God, what was happening to me? What the hell was going on?

Huh…what was going on? Hmm, let's see, the last thing I remembered was…being freed from prison. That dick of a guardian coming to release me, giving me some holier-than-thou crap-ass speech, and then…and then…oh, yeah. Opening the cell and letting me go only to plunge some damn needle in my neck and, uh…lights out.

Even that was a bit fuzzy, but no way I could've imagined that. I might have a vivid imagination, but even Rose Hathaway's not that creative. Those guardians _did _something to me. I don't know _what_ they did exactly, but somebody (my money was on the dick guardian, since he seemed to get off on my misery) grabbed me before I could even make it to my freedom and he drugged me or something.

All I remember was making some smart-ass, bitchy comment to them about not needing an escort to my room…then I remember someone restraining me and before I had the chance to actually put up a decent fight, the needle was being stabbed into my neck, and that was it.

Like that, I was just…gone…

And, _guardians_ had done that to me. I don't know why they would do that to me and I sure as hell have no idea why I was waking up surrounded by a bunch of Strigoi…and the guardians were long gone. They wouldn't have _put_ me here, would they? Yeah, I might be seen by some as a traitor but the idea that the guardians would willingly hand me over to the Strigoi just to avoid the long and grueling process of planning a damn execution was just ridiculous. It was absurd.

They were guardians—no matter what crime was committed, no matter what commandments were broken, it was just instinct for us to protect our own kind. To protect Moroi and dhampirs, alike. It was what we trained for—what we went to school for, what we literally dedicated our lives to. Giving one of our kind up to the Strigoi (even someone like me, who had the worse of reputations when it came to bad guardian reps) was just unthinkable. Yeah, sure, executions have been done in the past—it was rare among our kind, but it was called for from time to time.

And, even though I was hardly an appropriate candidate for execution by any means, this, _this_ was just…disturbing on all kinds of levels. It was too horrifying to even begin to comprehend; I couldn't, my brain literally could not process the idea that I had been handed over to the Strigoi as free game. I might be a bitch, but that in no way merited a death sentence, damn it.

But, as time rapidly went on and my mind went through every logical—and yes, even illogical—explanation in the book as to why the guardians would put me here, I kept coming up with nothing. No reason at all that would justify them putting me here. Nothing that would explain why I was here at _all_…

One thing that was and remained very clear once that realization was made was that…the guardians had definitely been the ones to put me here. No one else could've done it; they were the last ones to see me….oh, God….they had. It was the guardians…my fellow guardians had trapped me in a room with Strigoi…and left me here to die…

"Oh, shit," was all I could bring myself to say. Unfortunately, my voice was a lot more strained than I would've liked it to be, but considering the circumstances, I couldn't really bring myself to disguise it with my sarcasm or my wit right now.

Knowing it would be pointless, I couldn't help my fruitless attempts at struggling against my restraints—the ropes biting hard into my skin. God, it hurt—I felt quite certain I'd be drawing blood any minute now if I kept this up for too long.

"I must say, your reputation precedes you," the Strigoi who had spoken my name continued. He had an American accent, which surprised me. Huh, guess I had spent too much time in Russia, because I had gotten so used to Strigoi having an accent that it was weird to hear a Strigoi that didn't have one.

He took a step forward, his gaze locking on mine. A cruel, taunting smirk turned up the corners of his lips, as he waited for my response. That step forward—into the light, no less—gave me a good look at him. Or good enough to make out his features, anyways. He had a buzz haircut—looking almost like a guy who had just been drafted off to the military or something. What little hair he did have was dark—somewhere between a dark, dark brown and just pure black. He was about 6'3, I'd say, having the familiar bigger build of a dhampir. He appeared to have been in his mid-30s when he was turned. The boldness and authority in his features led me to believe he was the leader of this Strigoi group.

I gave another useless tug on my restraints before breathing a small, breathless chuckle. "That's what all the men tell me," I returned, with a small, careless shrug.

He grimaced appreciatively with that comment. "Hmm, is _that_ so?" He slowly began circling me, studying me intensely with an appreciative glint in his eyes. He looked me up and down, surveying me from head to toe.

"So it truly is," I said, managing to keep my voice cool and composed. "As I'm so sure you could imagine…" Probably not my best decision, bantering with the undead and hoping for the best, but as always, I could not seem to keep my mouth shut, despite my vain attempts.

"Hmm, really…because, ah…from what I hear, you aren't worth a second go." He now stood behind me. "In fact someone actually told me that once; who was that?" He placed both hands on my shoulders and leaned down to speak his next words right in my ear. "Oh, right. It was Dimitri."


	3. Chapter 3

"…_from what I hear, you aren't worth a second go…In fact someone actually told me that once; who was that? …Oh, right. It was Dimitri." _

The Strigoi's words rang in my ears, penetrating me through and through. Did I hear him right? Did he really say that—did Dimitri really think that I was…_bad_? Oh, God, those words knocked the wind out of me like no blow in the world had the power to do. That Strigoi literally could've held me down and slowly beat me to death…and those words _still_ hurt me more than anything else that could've possibly been said or done to me in that moment—

"_I've given up on you,"_ Dimitri's voice sounded in my ears, once again, proving me very wrong. _"Love fades. Mine has."_ Hmm, or maybe not. Guess Dimitri always took the cake in every situation. Or at least as far as I was concerned, anyway.

Oh, God, Dimitri...I couldn't believe that he would actually say something like that. Yeah, Dimitri was obviously Strigoi when he went bitching about me to this spineless, soulless son of a bitch, but still…the mere idea of him thinking I was anything less than…

God, it was too much for me to even consider. Whether or not Dimitri loved me now, I had no doubt that he definitely loved me then. As much as I tried to forget what happened in that cabin, I remembered that night as clearly as if it had just happened five minutes ago. I remembered his arms around me; I remembered his hands, his lips caressing my skin—his voice telling me over and over again how much he loved me, how beautiful I was…

Something as powerful as that wasn't something that could soon—or ever, for that matter—be forgotten. And, I knew—more than I knew anything else in the entire world—that it meant just as much to him as it did to me. That much, I was absolutely, 100% sure of.

I forced myself not to flinch at those words, though everything inside of me screamed to do just that. Instead, I breathed a chuckle and played it off with my flippancy. "Not what he said last night," I said, tilting my head slightly so that I could give the Strigoi a haughty—albeit, slightly suggestive look.

"Oh?" he asked, with feigned surprise. "Was that before or after he told you he didn't love you anymore, princess?"

This time, I did flinch. Though, I did manage to maintain the haughty mask surprisingly well—I was quite proud of myself. Damn it, how the hell did he know that? I decided to keep up with my careless approach, though, since it had a tendency to give me the upper hand—or at least make me feel like I had the upper hand.

"Oh, baby, once you've had me…" I began, with the slightest of smirks. "…it's only a matter of time before you come crawling back on your hands and knees, _begging_ for more. That nobility and burning desire to always do the right thing only goes so far…since the burning desire of Rose Hathaway is a hell of a lot more powerful."

The Strigoi straightened up, returning my smirk, though he looked quite impressed with my wit. "Huh…I could imagine," he agreed, looking me up and down, with an appreciative grimace. "Though, uh, I've gotta admit…I'd've thought you'd be the one on _your_ knees," he retorted.

He walked around in front of me, keeping his eyes glued to me—that smirk never leaving his lips. "And, what beautiful knees they are," he noted, as he came to a stop and sank to _his_ knees before me.

Oh, God. I stiffened up at his proximity, inevitably cringing away from him and the power of his penetrating gaze. The only Strigoi I had ever gotten this close to was Dimitri, but that was…I don't know, different. Yeah, he was still Strigoi; yeah, he was still evil, but he was still…Dimitri, to a certain extent. He was the empty shell of the man I still loved.

Even as a Strigoi, Dimitri had wanted me, had gotten this close to me and held me and kissed me, out of affection. Granted, it was a very twisted, very evil type of affection. But, he had assured me I was the only one he wanted, the only one he took any type of pleasure in. Evil or not, soulless or not, there was still some small part of my Dimitri in there, I realized, some small part of him that could want nothing else, but me. He was the first—the only—Strigoi to ever express interest or desires for anything outside of blood. For anything outside of the kill, the malice. And, I couldn't help but think that at least part of that interest was because it was _me_. Had it been anyone else that had hunted him down or happened across him, he'd've killed them in a heartbeat—no questions asked. But, it was me. And, I was the only one he had ever really loved…or was I?

I shook my head rapidly, in an attempt to snap myself out of it and shake it off. Turning my attention back to the Strigoi in front of me, my eyes darted down to his hands, which were now on my knees. His hands were stroking the bare skin of my knees, slowly working to shove my skirt up my legs, stopping at about my mid-thigh.

Okay, what the hell; whose brilliant idea was it to put me in a damn skirt? Or perhaps the more valid question should be why the hell did it take me so long to realize I was wearing a skirt? If this was some kind of guardian protocol no one told me about, to dress the traitor up before feeding her to the Strigoi, I've gotta say their originality was seriously lacking—

My thoughts were cut off as the Strigoi's hands now moved around to caress the inside of my knee before slowly easing my legs apart so he could kneel in between them.

Ugh, God…all right, I know I'm hot and everything, but could this bastard just cut to the chase and kill me already without the getting his rocks off part? I'd much rather skip that portion altogether, if I could, actually, because it was doing nothing for me.

I breathed another chuckle—though this one was a lot more strained and sounded more like a whimper than it did an actual chuckle. Still, I pressed on, needing to feel as strong as I usually did, needing to feel like I at least had a fighting chance—even if I didn't.

"Yeah? Well, we'll see how beautiful you think they are when they're slamming into your misters," I warned, quite proud of my ability to sound so threatening, even when afraid.

Efficiency or not, he was still unaffected by my words, go figure. In fact, if anything, they just spurred him on more. A fact very much evident when he slid his hands over to the inside of my thighs, tauntingly running his hands up my legs as he pulled them open even farther.

He leaned into me with the slightest of smirks, putting his lips right at my ear. I felt his smile widen against my ear as he spoke his next words. "Actually, sweetheart…" He chuckled once. "…I'd much prefer it if you were to _suck_ on my misters," he taunted. There was an emphasis on the word suck that made my stomach coil, twisting into a huge knot of nausea and revulsion.

"Ugh, dear God," I groaned. "Does _nothing_ turn you off?" I couldn't help but wonder.

"Not when it comes to you, love," he assured me, as he began nibbling on my earlobe. His hands moved up, sliding right under my ass, and he cupped the back of my thighs in his hands. He gently squeezed the skin there, trailing his lips down to my neck. His lips moved hungrily—greedily—against my throat.

I cringed away from him as far as I could, tilting my head down to try to deny him the access of my throat. I heaved, as if to throw up, but nothing actually came out. I was about to draw my legs back and shove them into his chest, in an attempt to get him off of me, when a new voice spoke up.

"Oh, for God's sake, Lucas, enough foreplay!" the voice was female. Exasperated and agitated. "Let's just kill the bitch already, huh? This was not part of the deal."

The Strigoi—Lucas, apparently—came to a sudden, abrupt stop in what he was doing and jerked away from me. Hmm, well, if that doesn't kill a dude's erection, I don't know what the hell will—

Wait, deal? Deal, what deal? There was a deal? Involving _me_? Oh, God, I so did not like the sounds of this. What the hell were the terms? "Off the bitch and save us the trouble", perhaps? "Thank you, good night. Now get out of here and leave us the fuck alone or else?"

Ugh, who was I kidding? Any number of Moroi wanted me killed—whether for my "murder" of Queen Tatiana or taking issue with me as a person (though I have no idea why anyone would have _any_ problem with me)—many, many Moroi and/or dhampirs would just love an excuse to get rid of me. And, I guess this proved as useful a method as any. It _was_ brilliant, I had to admit.

Release the supposed-traitor-dhampir-girl from prison, on the way towards her freedom, she is captured and killed by a bunch of Strigoi before the guardians could get to her in time. Nothing more than a tragic accident.

Lucas rose to his feet and, within seconds, was standing before the woman who had spoken. An average-sized former human, I'd say, judging by her build, with black shoulder-length hair. He seized her arm and violently tugged her towards him, bringing her into the light. "You're absolutely right, Maureen," he agreed, voice cold. He moved his hands up to cup her face in his hands, tilting her head up to look her in the eyes. "I should just kill the bitch already."

With a quick twitch of his arms, her neck snapped in two and he gave another tug, detaching her head completely from her body. Her body fell to the floor with a thud and her head soon followed, rolling away off into the darkness. For which, I was thankful since I wasn't too keen on spending my last moments watching Strigoi play dodge ball with a freakin' head…even if it was another Strigoi's head.

Without another word or thought regarding Maureen, Lucas turned on the rest of the Strigoi, power and fury radiating from him. God, the only Strigoi I had ever seen to have such power and actually bring about fear in fellow Strigoi was…well, Dimitri. Then again, Dimitri was a bad-ass—power was, like, his middle name, no matter what he was. Dhampir or Strigoi, that boy was all about the power and fear and kicking hard-core ass.

"Any other questions, comments…requests….on how and when I make my kills?" Lucas demanded, his voice loud and bold as his eyes scanned his fellow Strigoi. He hesitated briefly, almost as if actually waiting for an answer, before finally speaking again. "Good," he said, a note of finality in that one word. "Then, I highly recommend that you back the hell off and let me handle this my way…or something unfortunate is going to happen."

He kicked Maureen out of the way, casting a disgusted yet slightly triumphant look at her dead body. "Like _that_."

I rolled my eyes at that, refusing to let him scare me, no matter what. "I've got a question or two for you over here, buttercup," I said, snarky as ever, making him turn on his glare on me. This time, I was ready for it, though, so I didn't flinch in response to it. "About this, uh…so called deal? What are the terms exactly and why aren't I in the know about it?"

An amused glint shone in his eyes as he turned his attention on me. "No deal," he said, matter-of-factly. "No terms."

"Bull shit," I accused, my tone matching his perfectly.

He began walking towards me again, that amusement never leaving his eyes. "We're Strigoi," he pointed out. "We don't make deals. And, we certainly don't need an excuse to kill anyone—especially not a guardian with a reputation such as yours. Or any guardian at all, for that matter," he corrected himself.

"I'm taking that as a compliment," I said, narrowing my eyes at him.

"You should," he agreed. "Most of these Strigoi don't have very many dhampir kills under their belt yet. You should be honored to be the death that'll mark their names down in history—" He cut himself off abruptly, realizing he had said too much, though he tried to hide it.

"I'm sorry; history?" I repeated, pressing for clarification on the matter, even if it resulted in my horrible, gruesome death. "Bad-ass as I might be, I'm lacking a few credentials to be considered textbook worthy. No historian will be impressed with the kill, I assure you. I'm just another dhampir, some random guardian who's just happened to kick a lot of ass in her short-lived time."

"Oh, I think we all know that you are so much more than just some random guardian," he contradicted, that amusement growing in his voice. "Take some pride in yourself, huh? You might not feel the thrill of getting off on the kill like we Strigoi do, but you _have_ taken out more Strigoi in the past year or so than most guardians take out in their entire lives. And, you really think you're not something else?"

"Oh, I _know_ I'm something else," I agreed, with a slight shrug. "But, something tells me you aren't exactly in it for the glory of this, are you? So why are you doing this, aside from the obvious reasons? Taking out a few of your cousins in Russia hardly qualifies me to be your legendary kill—"

"No…but killing the Queen of the Moroi world certainly qualify you as my legendary kill," he said, a smile twisting at his lips.

"But, I didn't even—" It hit me. "Oh so that's what this is about? That's why you're so gung-ho about this? What; so gank the crazy-ass bitch and _you_ guys are the ones defending her honor? That's why you're killing me?"

I was utterly appalled. Since when did the Strigoi giving a rat's ass about Queen Tatiana; they should be thrilled about her death. It had left the Moroi world in chaos—lots of frantic, panicked Moroi running around. Scared, vulnerable—easy prey.

"No, that's why they _let_ me kill you," he told me, not needing to elaborate for me to know he meant the guardians. I couldn't help but flinch at that.

"Meaning?" I demanded.

"Meaning I have my own reasons for killing you," he replied, turning away from me to survey his Strigoi posse once again.

"Mm, let me guess; you're in desperate need of a good jerking off session?" I suggested, tilting my head to the side in an attempt to see him better since he had turned away from me.

He turned back to me, shaking his head slightly. "You are a colorful girl, aren't you?"

"It's been said," I said, with a slight grimace.

He breathed a chuckle. "While that would definitely be an effective solution to such a problem, afraid not."

"Gee, what a shame," I said dryly, giving him a weary look to really emphasize my sarcasm. "So what are your own reasons for killing me? Wait, let me guess. The fact that we're mortal enemies couldn't possible have anything to do with it, could it?"

"Oh, that definitely factors into the equation some, yes," he said, with a nod of his head. "However, aside from the glory and the mortal enemy aspects of it all, I do have my own personal issues and, uh…scores to be settled that contributed a hell of a lot more to that particular reasoning of mine."

"Care to share or am I gonna have to beat it out of you?" I pushed, getting frustrated with this cryptic crap. When he didn't answer me, I finally put two and two together. "Dimitri," I realized. He had mentioned Dimitri to me and it had never occurred to me that they had— "You were Strigoi buddies," I assumed.

He made a sound in the back of his throat that couldn't be distinguished between a laugh and scoff. "Not even," he said, sounding slightly amused at the mere concept.

"We were rivals," Lucas corrected. "Before the son of a _bitch_ came along—" he spat the word. "—_I_ was the big dog in Russia. All Strigoi answered to me, anything I said, goes. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. Then, Belikov came—all high and mighty—he rose to power, stole my thunder and all my minions, and within months, it was as if I never existed. I vowed I would get my revenge on him some day one way or another. And, what better way to get to Belikov…than to kill _you_, Hathaway?" he sneered, approaching me with the perfect cunning Strigoi mask distorting his features.

So, that's why Lucas was so set on killing me? To get back at Dimitri for what he did in Russia? He wanted to kill me…to _hurt_ Dimitri? "I swear to God…" I warned, through gritted teeth, tugging again at my restraints. "…when I get out of here, I am going to tear you apart."

If he wanted to hurt me, that's fine (I mean, I'd prefer he didn't, but if he absolutely had to, I could get down with that). But, not Dimitri. _Never_ Dimitri. If he wanted Dimitri, he would most definitely have to kill me first. And (wanting desperately to believe the best here, mind you), if he killed me, he would be in for a world of pain by the time Dimitri caught up to him. My death wouldn't exactly sit well with Dimitri, I'd like to think; especially, if it was some Strigoi asshole shanking my ass just to get revenge on him. No, Dimitri would in no way, ever let that go. Let's just say a stake through the heart would be quite humane, and pleasant even, compared to what Dimitri would put Lucas through if he laid a hand on me.

"That'd be a neat trick," Lucas said, that cold amusement only growing. He fixed me with an arrogant, taunting look that told me he had no doubt in his mind that I held no threat whatsoever to him. Oh, God, hearing that amusement in his grating voice just pissed me off even more. It made me want to break these damn ropes off my wrists and have myself a nice Strigoi massacre right here, right now.

I continued my struggle against my restraints, again to no avail. Lucas laughed, finally making me come to a halt, as I turned my glare on him. I was slightly out of breath from how hard I had been struggling, but I wasn't about to let him know that.

"What?" I snapped. "You've got a bone to pick with Dimitri, but you don't have the sack to take him on yourself? You've gotta resort to taking me out just to prove your point? _That_ is your master plan for knocking him down a couple notches? Well, newsflash: that ain't gonna do you much good, I assure you. Hell, it's not going to do you _any _good, for that matter," I corrected. "It's not going to work."

"Oh, but it is," he contradicted. "You misunderstand my intentions; you think I am only out to kill him and take back what's mine. But, it is so, so much more than that. I don't want to just kill Belikov, though that does have a major part to play in my end game."

"Then, what _do_ you want?" I demanded angrily, growing sick and fucking tired of these damn games of his.

In the blink of an eye—or maybe even faster, since I just happened to blink in that brief moment—Lucas was hovering over me, his hand stretching forward ever-so-slowly and wrapping gently around my throat. I tensed up, literally holding my breath as I stared into those pitiless eyes, knowing the slightest wince from me could very well result in my neck snapping in two.

His lips twitched into the smallest of smiles, as he watched the fear fill my eyes—despite my desperate attempts to try to hide it. "I, my dear…" he began, leaning towards me again so that his lips were now at my hair. So close, in fact, that I could feel his lips moving against my hair when he spoke again. "…want to destroy him."

"Well…" I breathed, a slight tremor in my voice. "…your plan has few flaws, admittedly, wouldn't you agree?" I challenged, fighting past the fear and braving this son of a bitch as long as it took for me to come up with an escape plan. "Dimitri's not here," I pointed out. "So his so-called destruction will be a little on the ineffective side." That cockiness was back in my voice with that realization.

"No," Lucas conceded. "He's not here. But, he will be," he added, straightening up with those words. "It's only a matter of time before Belikov realizes what's happened to you. And, you know as well as I do that once he does, he'll take upon himself the role of your knight in shining armor. He'll pick up that shield and that sword, he'll strap on that armor and he will come to slay the big bad dragon. And, save the damsel in distress, am I right? That's just who he is."

I gritted my teeth at those words. "I am no fucking damsel in distress, you son of a bitch. I fend for myself. I don't need _him_ to come save my ass; I'm just fine fighting on my own."

"Oh, but you are indeed in distress," he corrected. "And, in no way are you just fine fighting on your own. You really think you can take _all_ of us? By yourself? I know you've got yourself one hell of a reputation going for you, but even you have your limits, am I right?"

"I _really_ think I wanna test that theory," I snarled, narrowing my eyes at him in my utter loathing and revulsion.

"Do you now?" he challenged, now walking behind me again. "Well, by all means then…" He knelt down and I turned my head slightly to see him grab hold of my restraints and tear violently at them, jerking them off my wrists and letting them fall to the floor by his feet. "Hit us with your best shot, baby," he said, his hands on my shoulders as he leaned towards me to put his lips to my ear again.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N Hey guys, sorry for the UBER long hiatus, I feel like a hard-core total bitch over here :/ I started a Clois SV fic too so I've been alternating them to make sure neither fans are disappointed, updating one then the other so it took me a bit longer to finish this ch. I am so sorry and I promise I will update much sooner next time. I love you guys so much and thank you all so very much for your encouragement and your support. It means the world to me and please, continue reading and continue reviewing because that just makes my day :) Thanks again and I'll be back with more so please stay tuned. 3**

One good thing about being taunted and tormented while taken hostage by a sadistic group of Strigoi: you have plenty of time to sit there and strategize your escape plan while they're threatening to kill you or torture you or make your life a living hell or whatnot.

The bad thing is…sometimes those plans have an annoying tendency to blow up in your face. Yeah, karma's a real bitch to you when you kill undead, evil creatures of the night for some reason. And, uh, well…this just happened to be one of _those_ moments where my plan was bound to blow up in my face. Damn it.

Not wasting any time, the second those restraints fell free from my wrists, I brought my arm up and slammed my elbow hard into Lucas' face…only to have an intense raging fire scream its way through my arm, my elbow actually shattering from the impact.

"Oh, my—son of a fucking_ bitch_!" I screamed, through clenched teeth. I doubled over—still sitting in the chair—and clutched my elbow with my free hand.

Oh, God, that just made it painfully throb even more—God, it hurt so much. I tried twisting it so I could examine it and that sudden movement made me cry out again, my voice cracking slightly. Oh, my…God. I think…was it broken? What the _fuck_ was going on here? How could that possibly have broken it? I have been through so much—I have suffered way worse blows than that. Hell, I'd _given_ way worse blows than that. No reason why I should start falling apart now.

"Why, Rosemarie…" Lucas scolded, feigning disapproval with my profanity. "…you kiss your mother with that mouth?"

I managed to choke out a small, pained laugh. "No, but I fucked Dimitri with it," I muttered. Fighting through the pain, I rose to my feet and gave him the smallest of smirks. "Which is more than I can say for you."

With that, I gathered every ounce of strength I could muster and threw my forearm into his chest. The maneuver was intended to send him flying back (or rather just to get him away from me). Even at my strongest, I could never actually send a Strigoi flying back. I just like the idea that I could—I think it'd be kinda cool. Like in the movies. A Strigoi could send me flying back as easily as swatting a fly, but unfortunately, dhampirs did not quite have that strength.

So what was meant to fend him off was, in reality, my forearm colliding so hard with his chest that it snapped in two…and he didn't budge an inch. It was about as effective as throwing a toothpick into his chest and hoping he'd come crashing down.

"Son of a…bitch," I cried out, in my aggravation. I started throwing the full weight of my body into it, hoping that would help me gain at least a smidgen of an upper hand.

Lucas reached out—catching my arm in his grip before I could snatch it away—and with a mere flick of his arm, he jerked it back in the other direction—no doubt, breaking it _completely_. I could actually hear the sickening sound of the bone snapping in two.

I winced and bit back a scream, but otherwise, made no further acknowledgement to the pain. I would not let him intimidate me—I don't care how much strength or power he had over me; I refused to let myself be vulnerable.

Tightening his grip painfully on my arm, Lucas jerked me to the ground so that I was now on my knees before him. He bent down only slightly before ripping me up off the ground the rest of the way so he could whisper his words roughly in my ear. "Who said you had a say in _any_ of this? These shots are mine to call. Anything I say goes. You _will_ do as I tell you and you will not fight me."

I could feel the effects of compulsion taking me over and the burning desire of submission within me—everything inside me just yearning to do as he willed. Oh, God. Staring into those eyes, I felt wave after wave of compulsion come crashing down upon me, my will slowly but surely slipping away from me. I was just about ready to do anything he asked when I—

_No!_ I silently scolded myself. _No, no, no! Snap out of it, Rose, you've gotta snap out of this right now. _I shook my head and squeezed my eyes tightly shut, turning my head from side-to-side in my attempts to overcome the compulsion. "No!" I cried out loud, hoping that actually hearing it would make me stronger and more resistant to him.

"Yes!" he growled. He took my face tightly between his hands and locked it in place so I was forced to look at him.

"Oh, stick it!" I snapped back. "Far as it'll go," I suggested, as I continued my struggle against him.

"Hmm…" he mused. "Now _there's_ an idea."

A snappy retort was on my lips, but it died when he threw me back to the ground and grabbed hold of my face. Gripping my face so tightly between his hands, it was a wonder my skull wasn't crushed, he straightened up and began directing my head between his legs.

Oh, _hell_ no!

Once I realized his intentions, I began struggling even more against him—not that it did me any good. I tried desperately to pry his hands off of my face, cringing as far away from him as I could.

He jerked my head to side, bringing it down to run it along the inside of his leg. "Oh, God…" I cried out, but it was muffled. "God, no…" I tried to scream, but it was stifled. "Let me go," I nearly growled.

"Oh, I'm not even _near_ through with you yet," he taunted, laughter in his voice.

"God, I am going to kill you, you son of a bitch!" I spat.

Unaffected by my threat, he merely continued his tormenting me. "What's that, baby? Harder? Happy to oblige," he said, with a shrug.

With that, he pressed my head even harder against his leg, barely brushing it against his groin, before bringing it back down the inside of his other leg.

"Get off me!" I shouted, my voice actually hoarse from all the screaming I had been suppressing.

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Rosemarie," he said, with a feigned apologetic tone. "No, you see…you _want _me."

He moved my head up and began pressing it against his groin again—this time, much harder. Oh, God…I could actually feel his erection growing more and more prominent through his jeans. Okay, what the hell kind of Strigoi wears jeans? That just didn't really scream sadistic, diabolic fiend who could snap your neck as easily as if it were a pencil, you know? That was just too weird to even get—

_Oh, fuck! _

My thought process was entirely cut off as he now began shifting himself against me so that I could actually feel the _head_ of his…his manhood. My parted lips rolled across it, and the way he shifted actually made it seem as if it would actually enter my mouth. Jeans as a barrier or not. Oh, God—oh, my…God!

I gagged and jerked myself away, but I didn't get very far. His hand was right there, fisting in my hair and jerking my head back to his groin before I could actually get away. I did manage to jerk my head to the side so I could speak. Barely. "Ugh, God…" I choked out. "Not in this lifetime, Romeo. Now, get…the fucking hell off of me…or I swear to _God_—"

"No, Rose, you don't understand," he replied, his voice as smooth and calm as if he was talking to a child.

He jerked me away and held my gaze with a powerful, penetrating one of his own. "You want_ me_…"

The familiar waves of compulsion were suddenly crashing over me again—one right after another. Stripping me of my will…and replacing it with _his_. I tried to fight it off, but he was way too strong for me. Compulsion is almost impossible to resist when wielded by Moroi, but when wielded by Strigoi (despite how compulsion resistant I am), it is _very_ impossible to resist.

Despite how hard I fought—how determined I was to maintain some tiny shred of who I was—it was to no avail, just as my other attempts to fight had been. It was only a matter of time before I would give in and do anything—_anything_—he told me to. God only knew what he would force upon me—

"Roza…" his voice shifted into the warm, familiar voice I loved.

Oh, God. No. No, I could not give into this—I would not let this son of a bitch ruin my image of Dimitri. No, I couldn't—I had to hold onto Dimitri.

_Dimitri, Dimitri, Dimitri,_ I told myself over and over again to latch on to who he was, to what he was. I held on to Dimitri with every ounce of strength I had—refusing to let go for anything. Not for the world. Not for—

Dimitri.

Dimitri suddenly materialized before me. _My_ Dimitri—the Dimitri I had always loved. It _was_ Dimitri. Down to his lame-ass brown cowboy duster coat (which I still did not understand his fixation with), his tall, lean, well-muscled body, his long, dark brown hair, hanging free over the sides of his face, his warm, loving dark eyes…

Oh, God, looking into those eyes, I saw everything that is Dimitri. Everything I fell in love with. I saw the bravery and the fierceness in his eyes—I saw the strength and the stoicism that he was practically comprised of. God, this was my Dimitri. This was dhampir Dimitri.

But how did he—? Ah, what the hell! What did it matter?

"Dimitri?" I breathed, the slightest of smirks twitching at my lips. "You're here…" I trailed off, not really knowing what else to say or where to go from here. It just didn't make any sense that he was here. But sense or no sense, I sure as hell wasn't one to question it.

Breathing the smallest of chuckles, he stretched his hand out towards me, grasped my hand in his, and pulled me to my feet. "Where else would I be?" he said, with a slight shrug.

He never did let go of my hand. Giving my hand a gentle squeeze, his free hand moved up to brush the hair away from my face, tucking it behind my ears.

"You've never looked so good, Roza," he noted, regarding me with utmost admiration and affection...but there was something else there too. Something that I couldn't identify.

Wanting to be as strong he was so sure I was, I managed a weak smile for him and a nonchalant shrug. "Yeah, well…I feel good."

"I remember," he said, with a wicked smirk. There was a suggestive glint in his eyes as he took me in, looking me up and down. Okay. So _not_ a Dimitri thing to say, but whatever. I could get down with that, I guess.

"Yeah, sweet," I mumbled, the words barely coherent. "Whatever." I shook my head and abruptly changed the subject. "Uh, what the hell are you doing here?"

"Do you…not want me here?" he asked, confused.

"No," I said too quickly. "I mean, yes, I do," I immediately corrected myself. "It's just a—bit of a surprise is all. Last time I saw you, you told me you could never love me again."

Well, okay, that wasn't the last time I saw him, but that was the last time I counted. It just made things a hell of a lot less confusing for me if I pretended that whole thing with him protecting me from the guardians never happened. It gave me a headache if I thought about it for too long and—as much as I lied to myself—all I did was think about it.

Dimitri took a bold step towards me, stepping so close I could actually feel the press of his body against my own. Something that he definitely _never_ let happen, ever. "Last time you saw me, I told you a lot of things that weren't true, Rose. I would've thought you'd know better than to actually believe something like that by now."

"Okay, you know what?" I held up a hand to stop him. "This is a beautiful moment we're having here; can it please wait until_ after_ we get out of here? Let's just worry about saving my life now and then we'll worry about the seeing if there's still room for you in it part later."

"What's the hurry?" he asked, slightly concerned, but seemingly more annoyed than anything else.

Okay, seriously? _What_ the hell was going on with him? I stared at him incredulously. "My hurry is my intense desire to make it out of this alive. God, Dimitri, what is wrong with you? I'm sorry, but bad-ass as you might be, there's, like, eight Strigoi in this room alone. God only knows how many more in the building—our chances aren't looking too good. I highly doubt we can take them alone—"

"There's no Strigoi here, Rose," he said, confusion distorting his features.

"What?" Oh, God…I was drowning in my delirium by this point. My freakin' _delirium_ was getting delirious.

"No Strigoi," he repeated. "There's just you and me. And, we have all the time in the world."

I chuckled once, but there was no trace of humor in it. "Okay…that's it. Just what twisted, alternate universe have I fallen into because this can't be happening?"

"The twisted, alternate universe of reality, perhaps," he suggested, taking yet another step towards me.

"Dimitri, what the hell is going on here? What is this?" I cried out, a desperate plea for some assurance that I wasn't imagining this.

"This is me making up for lost times," he answered me.

Regarding me with utmost seriousness, like he always, always had, the hand that had brushed my hair behind my ear slowly moved over from where it had been hovering beside my head, his fingertips now light against my cheek. He hesitated a brief moment before dragging his fingertips along my skin.

"You really think it's that simple?" I demanded, shaking my head in exasperation. "You can't just flip a switch after what you did to me."

"I realize that," he said. "I know I hurt you, Rose. I can't even imagine what I put you through."

"No," I said icily. "You _really_ can't."

He gave a soft, sympathetic sigh before withdrawing his hand and lowering it to his side. "Rose—"

"Don't," I interrupted, averting my eyes from his.

"Rose—" he tried again.

My eyes snapped up to meet his. "No, Dimitri, I _said_ don't," I repeated, my voice much harder and colder than before.

He actually flinched, his expression hardening at my tone.

"We don't have the time for this," I said, lowering my head to make looking away from him all the easier. "We have to get out of here."

"No, we don't have to do anything," he contradicted, sounding so much like Strigoi Dimitri that it actually made _me_ flinch. He reached out and grabbed hold of my arm. "We're staying right here until we clear the air—"

"We stay, we die," I cut him off again, jerking my arm out of his grip.

"I am not letting you leave, Rose," he said, his voice just as bold and hard as mine had been—only his was a hell of a lot more intimidating than mine had been. Damn it. I hated how effortless it was for him to show me up—it made me look so bad.

"You gonna stop me?" I said, taking a stubborn stance, folding my arms across my chest as I stared him down. "Cause you're gonna have to."

He raised an eyebrow, looking slightly amused by my challenge. As well he should have, since I knew that 9 ½ times out of 10, he could take me down in a heartbeat, without even tensing a muscle.

"Suppose I could arrange that," he said, with a slight shrug.

And, before I knew what was happening—or could bring myself to stop him, for that matter—his lips were suddenly crushing mine.

"Dimitri," I tried to say, but it was too late. And way too muffled by his lips for either of us to make sense of. And, by that point, well…I _wanted_ to give in.

The second his lips touched mine, all reason and pretenses had been dropped. Yeah, it was kind of hard to find the will to pull away and see such reason when someone as hot as Dimitri was kissing you. Everything inside me longed for just this. That intense, burning desire for him flared up within me again, taking on a life of its own.

Feeling urged on by that, knowing I wasn't rejecting him, Dimitri took a bold step forward. Winding one arm tightly around my waist, his free hand moved up, closing around my arm. Those all too familiar calloused fingertips of his trailed gently up my arm. He gave my shoulder a passionate squeeze before snaking his hand around my neck to tangle with my hair. His fingers wound around the individual strands, twining in my hair so that he could tilt my head back slightly to make kissing me all the easier.

My lips finally parted, a soft whimper escaping my lips. His tongue immediately darted out, tracing the shape of my lower lip and then went in further to tangle with my tongue and then up to trace the shape of my upper lip before going back down and repeating the process.

And, that kiss melted into another and another. And another. The pressure and intensity with which we kissed steadily increased—our lips moving hard and urgently against each other's. Our lips were practically fused together by this point—our hands everywhere, even though nothing was actually removed yet. Oh, it was only a matter of time before the barriers of clothing were no long an issue.

His arm tightened around my waist, his body pressing further against mine. His fingertips slid into the back of my shirt, tracing along my spine. Oh, God, the feel of his skin on mine was like dousing a raging fire with gasoline. My flesh inevitably burned at his touch, knowing no other reaction. This couldn't even be called a burning touch right now. No, _this_, right now, was a searing touch. Anywhere his lips, his hands, his skin touched, I was seared through and through by it—seared through to my very core.

His fingertips pressed further into my skin—dragging along my back, my waist, down to squeeze my hip and then back up around to clutch desperately at my shoulder blades.

Tightening his hold on me, he took yet another step towards me—all too eager to close any and all space between us—the step, incidentally, that it took for him to shove me against the wall.

I felt the slightest of pain from it, but I masked my pain in my horniness, throwing myself more intensely into the kiss. A smirk twitched at his lips, but he never did break the kiss. No, if anything, he managed to deepen it.

Reaching down, he grabbed a hold of my legs, racing his hands up the inside of my thighs and prying them apart even farther to enable him to step in between them. Somehow, he managed to hoist me up and fit my legs around his waist one-handed as a way to close off that space between us. With an eager lurch from him and an instinctive arching of my back, he was now completely pressed up against me. My God, that boy was just all kinds of talented, wasn't he? No matter how well I knew him, no matter what he did, he never failed to impress me.

His hands moved down to the outside of my legs to intensify the pressure of them against his waist, digging them hard into his hips. His lips were on mine again—pressing one, two, three…and okay, I lost track. I wanna say somewhere between five and fifty more kisses on my lips.

His body pressed harder against mine and he began shifting his weight against mine. He started to hike my skirt up, pushing it further up my legs until my hips were literally exposed so he could start stroking my bare hipbones.

He continued massaging my hipbones, rubbing them until they were very much rubbed raw—my skin actually red from the pressure of it.

And, by this point, he had moved on from just kissing and had actually transferred his lips to my throat. Continuing his lifelong endeavors of being freaking welded onto me or something, he persisted in pressing himself closer to me. How that was even possible by this point was so beyond me. We were about as close two bodies could actually get without removing that barrier of clothing—which something told me was mere seconds to follow. Huh…who said perseverance always has to be a bitch?

"Oh, God…" I cried out, tilting my head deliriously from side-to-side, my eyes fluttering open and shut in my ecstasy. "Oh, God, Dimitri…"

"_Oh, God…" I cried out, tilting my head deliriously from side-to-side, my fluttering open and shut in my ecstasy. "Oh, God, Dimitri…" _

Wait, what? What the hell was that? Answering my unspoken question was a vision. A flash, so to speak. No. Wait…a memory.

_My eyelids felt like thousand pound weights that wanted so desperately to close, but I forced them to stay open and slowly raised my head, my eyes flitting over to meet Dimitri's. His fingertips were light against my cheek and once our eyes locked, he allowed the smile to escape his lips. _

My eyelids felt like thousand pound weights that wanted so desperately to close, but I forced them to stay open and slowly raised my head, my eyes flitting over to meet…Dimitri's? His fingertips were light against my cheek and once our eyes locked, he allowed the smile to escape his lips

…but this, this was different. His smile didn't hold the warmth and love and affection that it usually did. It wasn't his smile. Something was wrong. Something was horribly wrong.

_Dimitri's palms pressed hard against my shoulder blades, his fingertips digging into my shoulders to get a good hold on me. Writhing and thrashing against me, he continued moving his body against mine, somehow squirming his way further inside of me. _

_Wrapping my hands around his forearms to lock them in place against the bed, I broke the kiss and trailed my lips down—down his throat and his chest, burying my lips in the sweat-coated, scalding hot flesh exposed to me. _

Dimitri's palms pressed hard against my shoulder blades, his fingertips digging into my shoulders to get a good hold on me. Writhing and thrashing against me, he continued moving his body against mine...

Oh, God…something about the way he held me, the way his lips moved against my flesh, the way he murmured my name, it was all just…so painfully wrong. That realization, that knowledge, it actually _hurt _me.

_Dimitri fit so perfectly inside of me, almost as if he was molded and shaped from me. He was throbbing violently inside me, rocking harder and harder against me. My inner walls were contracting around him, tightening around his erection almost as if my body itself was desperate to lock him inside me and never let him go. _

_He continued thrusting into me, his thrusts growing even longer and harder than before, intensifying the pressure as he plunged himself deeper inside of me. Wrapping his arms around me, his hands tightly gripped me shoulders and he clutched me desperately to him._

Dimitri wasn't actually _in_ me now, but he didn't have to be. I didn't need him anywhere in the vicinity of me to know that something was…off with him. When we did have sex, he didn't treat me like this. Yes, he had wanted me and yes, he was just as affected by me as I was by him. He loved me. I knew that. More than anything, I knew that. But this…this was just so different. It wasn't right. It just…it wasn't right.

_Every inch of my skin burned at his touch—the feel of his skin gliding against mine, the feel of his hands, his lips caressing me brought with it a fire I had never known existed. Anywhere his skin would connect with mine was like touching a flame of that very fire_…

…_Hips bucking hard together, scorching hot flesh on scorching hot flesh, our sweaty, writhing bodies moving so perfectly in synch with one another, it was as if we were very literally one body, the already-hard-core thrusts of his rock-hard, throbbing erection intensifying—each one pounding even harder and deeper into me…_

God, that memory…it was so vivid, so real, it was practically tangible. It was like I could literally reach out and touch it and everything would be okay. Everything would be so much better than okay—it would be perfect. Beyond perfect. It was just like it had been that night in the cabin. It was like it had been when he was holding me, assuring me of his love for me, and how much I meant to him…

_It was being close without needing actual, physical proximity. It was feeling something without needing to actually, physically _feel_ him. It was wanting and needing him on such a different level, wanting and needing him without actually, physically wanting and needing him. It was holding the world—the entire universe—in my hands by merely holding him in my arms. It was the realization and acceptance that he was my world, he was my very universe. It was the fact that nothing else could exist outside the two of us so long as we were _here_. _

_There was Dimitri, there was me, and there were the flaring flames of the already-raging fire that consumed us and completely took us over, incinerating the world around us and filling us with such passion and desire until there was absolutely nothing left. Nothing but us._

Nothing.

_Nothing. _

It suddenly hit me, like a semi-truck slamming right into my gut. Oh, God…oh, God, it wasn't…Dimitri. Whoever, whatever this was, it was not Dimitri.

"You're not Dimitri—"

At that moment, I was cut off by the familiar points of fangs—of Strigoi fangs—sinking into the tender flesh of my throat. Oh, God…

I let out a small cry at the brief moment of pain I felt with those fangs piercing my skin…a small cry that soon melted into a sigh of contentment. One of utter and total bliss as those endorphins now flooded my body, immediately getting into my bloodstream and taking me over.

"Dimitri," I managed to cry out, keeping my eyes locked on his. I watched in a fascinated horror as he changed from the image of Dimitri he had compelled me to see…

…to Lucas.

"Oh, God…" my voice broke, despite my better judgment.

"Oh, love," Lucas said, as he finally pulled away from my neck and wiped the remaining blood off his lips with the back of his hand. "God isn't going to help you out of this." He peeled me off the wall, jerking me towards him so I was pressed up against him. "No one will," he whispered roughly in my ear.

Before I could actually respond or attempt to beat the hell out of him for playing the fucking Dimitri card, he tossed me to the side…where a pair of other Strigoi arms caught me. Oh, wait. Not just one.

Several Strigoi arms stretched forward, shoving the other arms out of the way and fighting to get a hold on me. Each and every one of them were desperate to have themselves a taste of the apparently legendary Rosemarie Hathaway…

"Eat up, my loyal friends," Lucas announced, beaming with pride. "We finally found restaurant that delivers…and this is our very own all-you-can-eat buffet. Just…don't kill the girl. That will be my doing—it will happen in my time. Understand?...Good. Have at it then."

And, that was the last thing I heard before I had multiple sets of Strigoi fangs sink into me, drinking me for everything I had, like their lives depended on it. I couldn't tell how many sets of teeth were there exactly…but it was definitely quite a number.

And, following those innumerable fangs, came the inevitable immeasurable bliss that I would very willingly die for. Compulsion or no compulsion, I'd give my life—I'd give my heart, my soul, every last drop of blood—to feel such pure happiness, such complete contentment. And, if that resulted in my death…

…Well…


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Hey, guys, sorry again for the hiatus-I started reading Richelle's Dark Swan series and I couldn't bring myself to stop so I could update, but here it is. This chapter (and the beginning of next ch.) will be in Dimitri's POV (yes, guys, he's FINALLY back, and he's gonna kick himself some hard-core Strigoi ass to get Rose back. Hope you guys like and if you have any questions, comments, requests, or anything of the like, please feel free to msg me or review. Always love hearing from you guys. :)**

**Dimitri's POV:**

"So," Lissa began, as she stopped walking and took a seat on a bench out in the courtyard. "…exactly how long do you plan on avoiding Rose?" She leaned back, resting her back against the tree behind her and tilting her head slightly to see me better.

Guardian instincts in me made me remain standing before her, taking almost sense of comfort in that familiar stance. I wanted to avert my eyes so that she couldn't read the truth behind them, but then I remembered. Lissa wasn't Rose. She didn't _know_ me like Rose did. Lissa could gaze into my eyes forever and never see the truth in them, but Rose…

Oh, God, Rose…one look into my eyes and the deepest, darkest secrets of my soul were revealed to her. The secrets I longed to keep from her, she came to know without any effort on her part. It was just a natural, easy thing for her to know me—to know everything about me. And, despite my better judgment, everything inside me burned for her to know that everything… just as I knew everything about her.

"As long as I can manage to," I finally replied, keeping my face and my voice flat and emotionless. Thank God for that honed up poker face of mine or who knew which of those mysteries Lissa would unlock within me.

Lissa made I sound that I couldn't quite distinguish between a laugh and scoff, making my eyes jerk to her in surprise. I regarded her inquiringly before she finally answered my unspoken question. "Okay, you do realize this is _Rose_ we're talking about here, don't you? Locked away or not, it's only a matter of time before she finds a way to force you to see her."

"Yes, I realize that," I conceded, allowing myself a small, resigned sigh. I walked over to stand against the tree, resting my back against it and folding my arms across my chest. "I realize that she won't stop trying." I shook my head slightly. "But, I also realize that it's not going to work. Whatever she does, whatever she says…I'm not going to see her. I can't. At least not right now."

Lissa gave a weary sigh. "When, then? Dimitri, you can't keep doing this to her. Or to yourself, for that matter. Despite what you have convinced yourself, you don't deserve it. And, Rose sure as _hell_ does not deserve it after what she went through for _your_ sake. Even if you don't understand that, you should, at the very least, appreciate it."

"I do," I said, keeping my eyes averted from hers. "I know exactly what Rose went through for me, I get it. I understand the pain and agony she endured for me and God, am I grateful—"

"No, Dimitri," Lissa began, her voice so uncharacteristically cold and bitter that I actually cut myself off abruptly, startled by the sudden change in her tone. "You couldn't possibly even begin to conceive…what Rose went through for you. You could never understand it—you didn't see it. Not like I did."

"I saw it," I contradicted, my voice as dry and emotionless as it had been before. "I _caused_ it. Everything she went through—everything she's going through…all of it is because of me."

"No." Lissa's voice was back to the gentle, comforting sound I had grown so used to, making me ease up only slightly. "Not because of you, Dimitri. _For_ you. Everything Rose went through—everything Rose is going through…is not because of you. It is for you. And, she'd go through it again and again if it meant keeping you safe."

"I know she would," I said, with yet another shaky sigh. "That's the problem. I can't let her do that. Not for me, not because of me. I can't. I won't."

Lissa stared at me for a long moment, incredulous. "And, a good way to avoid that pain is to completely destroy her, right? To break her heart and just expect her to understand? After everything else she's been through, you're really going to ask this of her? You're going to force her to lose everything she's ever cared about, everything she's ever loved?"

"She loves you, too," I pointed out, in a desperate attempt to mask my emotions.

"Yes, but not in the same way," Lissa returned.

"I should hope not," I said, with the slightest hint of an amused smirk. "But, my point is that Rose is not losing everything. She still has you. And, she always will. She had you long before she ever knew me and she did just fine—"

"Because she didn't know you," she cried out. "Rose is not the same person she was back then, Dimitri; she's changed. Loving someone like that—loving someone like Rose loves you—it changes you. And, no matter what happens, you can never go back to the person you were before. You should understand that."

"Love isn't the only emotion that creates an irreversible change in a person," I tried to explain, not wanting her to hate me, but needing her to understand why I was doing this. "Pain does. And fear. Intimidation and manipulation. All of which I used against her as a Strigoi. No matter how much she loves me, no matter how much she wants to forgive and forget…that can't erase what I've done. It doesn't just make it better. It doesn't make it go away."

"You really think Rose gives a damn about any of that?" she challenged. "Dimitri, all that pain, that fear…Rose doesn't care. She doesn't love you any less. Nothing you ever could've done to her as a Strigoi would've changed that fact. Nothing could. She knows everything you have done and guess what? She doesn't blame you for any of it."

"And, therein lies the problem," I said boldly, my voice intense to really get my point across. "She doesn't hate me…but she should. She is twisting this all around, making excuses for me. Just because it's me. Had it been anyone else, she would driven a stake through their heart like that. No questions asked. No ifs ands or buts about it…no hesitation. But, it was me."

"Well, now that's not exactly true, is it?" she asked, a wry glint in her eyes.

"What?" was all I could say, not understanding the smugness in her voice.

"It wasn't you," she explained.

"But, it was," I insisted.

"No," she said, voice hard. "It wasn't. There was nothing in you…that was Dimitri Belikov anymore. It was not Dimitri Belikov that hurt Rose—it was not something that was _in _you. It was something that was _done_ to you. It was not _you, Dimitri_, that did those things to Rose. It was that _thing_—" she sneered the word. "—that took you over. It was the Strigoi that was using your body as a meat suit, forcing you to do its bidding. It had nothing whatsoever to do with you.

"You would never willingly do anything that would ever bring harm upon Rose, not ever. Had you not been taken, had that Strigoi not chosen you, you would never, in a million years, have done anything to hurt her. You would've gone on to be together, guard me here at the Court, and you would've somehow gotten that happily-ever-after that you both so deserve. What happened to you…that was not you losing your right to have her. That was merely an obstacle in your path—one that has been removed. And, one that you cannot let stand in your way anymore. You deserve to be happy, Dimitri, you both do."

"Rose does," I agreed. That, I would always and forever agree with. Rose was, without a doubt, the best person I have ever known. If anyone deserved happiness in this life, it was her. "And, that is why I have to…stay away from her," I forced the words out. God, they hurt so much to say. "I can't give that to her, not after everything we—I don't know how to give her what she deserves."

"No, Dimitri…you are the only one who can give Rose what she deserves. You're the only one who has what it takes. If you really want her to be happy, if you want her to have everything she deserves…you have to move past this. You have to let it go and realize that the only way to make things right here is to let Rose back into your life."

I jerked my head to the side slightly—hopefully, before she could see the pain distort my features. "Look, I know you mean well. I know you have the best of intentions and you're looking out for Rose's well-being. But, that is what _you_ have to realize. That is exactly what I am doing too. My methods are just different than yours, but trust me, in the long run…everything will work out for the best. She will have everything she deserves. Rose's happiness is everything to me, Princess—"

This time, her sigh was frustrated and annoyed. "Oh, my God, for the last time, Dimitri…if you call me Princess or Vasilisa one more time, I am going to find a way to take down your sorry ass, got it? I'd wager to say all formalities were dropped the day I changed you back to a dhampir. Considering the bond that created between us, I think that's about as close and impenetrable as bonds can get. No more titles. No more bowing or curtseying or whatever else it is you feel so inclined to do. Just…hanging out and talking, all right? I might not be Rose, but you don't have to treat me like this anymore. I am no longer Princess Vasilisa Dragomir, the last of the Dragomir line, as far as you are concerned. Understand? A simple Lissa would suffice."

The slightest of smirks twitched at my lips, but I practically had to force it. It didn't come easy to me like it did with Rose. With Rose, it came before I even realized it—without any effort on my part. It came as natural to me as breathing. But, with Lissa…I had to force my lips to remember how to smile and just hope to God I wouldn't scare her with whatever look was actually on my face.

"Lissa," I murmured. "My sincerest apologies. Old habits die hard and, all things considered, I can't help but revere you as a goddess. I know that bothers you and you don't like the attention that inevitably brings upon you, and I'm sorry. I am…but, you saved me. You can't expect me to just let that go. That is something I will never forget and will never fail to acknowledge."

"And, Rose?" she repeated, sounding like a broken record. "What about her? What is she, a fucking potted plant? Dimitri, I didn't do anything." She practically laughed the words. "All I did was drive some stupid stake through your chest—big fucking deal. Rose stuck lots of stupid stakes in your chest. Hell, she even smacked you around a little bit too. She has shown me up in ways you could never imagine—you should worship the ground she walks on. The only reason Rose didn't drive that particular stake into your chest was because a spirit user had to be the one to do it. Or so Robert Doru said. I'm not so sure how reliable his word is, considering he's a crazy-ass lunatic, but hey. You know what? It worked.

"You have no idea how badly Rose wanted to be the one to do it. She longed to be the one to free you from that state—she couldn't think about anything else until she knew you were freed. She journeyed to the ends of the earth to find you. She endured a hell that you could never even begin to comprehend. She gave _everything_ for you, Dimitri—she gave everything she ever had. Including_ me_. And, here you are, acting like it's no big deal. Like she did nothing."

Oh, God…I clenched my fists by my side, almost as if that might help to ease my pain somehow. It didn't. No, that pain—that utter agony—it surged its way through me. It was very literally a part of me—such an intense part that it seemed as if I was comprised of nothing but pain. Pain and regret and guilt…what else was there? There was nothing outside of this.

"I—I don't—" I began, hating how hard it was for me to speak now. I cleared my throat, turning my head to the side, swallowing hard in an attempt to choke back my emotion. "I acknowledge what Rose did for me…" I tried again.

Lissa breathed a chuckle and I turned my eyes to her, trying to understand the reason behind the laughter. She narrowed her eyes accusingly at me, shaking her head slightly, in her aggravation. "You so don't get it, do you? It's not enough to just acknowledge…what she did for you, Dimitri. If roles were reversed, how would you feel if Rose was blowing you off, after you gave everything you had to offer for her? If you sacrificed everything you loved and dedicated your life to for her—forsaking all you had learned, all you had ever believed in and cared about—and she repaid you by telling you she could never love you again…how would you feel?"

Grimacing, I sank down to the empty seat beside her on the bench, hesitating slightly before placing a trembling hand over hers. "All right, that might have a little harsh, I'll admit it—"

"So, are you admitting that you still love her?" Upon hearing the underlying hope in her voice, a gut-wrenching agony twisted my stomach painfully.

_Yes_, I immediately thought, longing to say just that.

"I'm…going to plead the fifth on that one," I said sheepishly, forcing myself to shove that agony aside for now and focus on the more important matter at hand here: Keep Lissa from discovering the truth.

Lissa rolled her eyes. "You can't do that; you're not even an American," she said, nudging me playfully with her shoulder. Guess as an attempt to lighten the mood and try her hand at a joke between us.

It worked. She got a smile out of me. Granted, she was no Rose—no one could ever make me smile like Rose could—but she was definitely a fair substitute. "Doesn't mean I'm going to tell you anything."

"Doesn't mean you have to," she let me know. "Believe it or not, I have been on your side of this. I made my fair share of mistakes with Christian. I hurt him. I betrayed him in ways I never thought I…"

She broke off, shaking her head miserably. "…and, it killed me every time I thought about it. Just knowing I was capable of hurting him so much—seeing the pain and suffering I caused him—that was so hard to move past. But, I did. We did. That's what love is about—it's about realizing neither of you are perfect. You're going to make mistakes and you're going to screw up…but, that doesn't mean you give up just because things get hard. That just means you have to work twice as hard to make it work."

I breathed a dry chuckle, one that hurt coming out. "Yeah, overindulgence, slaughtering half of Russia—that's the same."

"It was much more than just overindulgence, Dimitri," she chastised me, for speaking so lightly on the matter. "Avery didn't just turn Christian and me against each other. She completely ruined me as a person. Everything I was, she destroyed. She stripped me of all my inhibitions, making me forget everything important to me. Everything I ever held dear in my life. And, for what? Just to make myself forget about Rose and the excruciating agony I felt with her gone? It was so not worth it. It never could be, no matter what fleeting sense of satisfaction was seemingly achieved. Dimitri, please…don't repeat my mistakes. Or slaughtering half of Russia will seem quite insignificant in comparison, believe me."

"It already does seem quite insignificant in comparison to what I did to Rose," I admitted. "As bad as it was, what I did to those people…it was nothing compared to what I put her through."

"And, what a great way to make up for your past mistakes: you make more mistakes," she said, sarcasm lacing her voice. "That is not making anything better for anyone. You're only making matters worse. You owe it to her to at least try to make it work. After everything you put her through, I think it is quite necessary that you make amends, apologize properly for your wrongdoings, and give it your all. You try to make it work—that is how you make it better."

"There _is_ no making it better, Lissa," I muttered, hanging my head in my shame. "Nothing I ever say or do is going to make anything better for anyone. Not me, not her—"

She held up a hand to stop me, shaking her head fiercely. "Okay, Dimitri, then answer me this. No games, no lies, just straight out, tell me the truth."

"All right," I agreed, dreading the question since I knew exactly what it was.

Lissa turned to me, waiting for my eyes to meet hers before finally asking the question. "Do you still love Rose?"

I opened my mouth to fabricate some sort of response that could qualify as an answer when—thank God—my attempts were cut off by my name being shouted in the distance.

"Guardian Belikov!" the frantic voice carried to me, as loud and clear as if it was coming from right beside me.

I flinched at the sound of the name that I had not heard in months. I had been stripped of my title upon my return, and through the chaos of the queen's murder and Rose going to trial for it, no one had found the time to reinstate me as a guardian. Not that I had really minded, I didn't deserve the reinstatement anyway.

Hearing the panic in the voice, I rose to my feet and turned to see Mikhail Tanner running towards me. Lissa swiftly rose to her feet and stood beside me, despite my instinctive attempts to shield her body with my own. Not that I thought Mikhail posed a threat against her or anything, it was just second nature to guardians to label everything as a potential threat.

"Guardian Tanner." I gave a nod of acknowledgement, as he approached us, going so fast he practically had to skid to a halt. "What can I do for you?"

"Princess," he muttered, trying to give her a bow, but it was quite clumsily done, considering how panicked he was right now.

"She's gone," Mikhail turned his attention back on me, his breathing quite labored from the run. "Rose, she's gone," he clarified, before I could ask.

My blood ran cold with those words. Fear surged through me, consuming me and entirely taking me over. Oh, God. Gone? How did—how could she be gone?

"Gone?" I repeated tonelessly, after a long moment. "What do you mean, gone? What happened?" Urgency now replaced my lack of emotion, that fear within me shifting into something else. Something even I could not properly identify.

"I don't know, she's just gone," he gasped out. "I don't—I can't—I'm not sure exactly what happened."

"What is that supposed to mean?" I demanded, taking a bold step forward.

"It means I wasn't in on the 411," he told me. "Something happened, the guardians—I don't know what they did, but I found something. I can't tell you. I have to show you."

"Show me?"

"Yes, show you," he repeated, throwing his hands up in an emphatic gesture. "Rose was taken somewhere. I don't know where and I don't know why, but I know the guardians were involved. I found the paperwork, authorizing her release. I went to check on her, but she was gone."

That dimmed some of my fear, anyways. "Well, that doesn't mean anything; maybe she's just in her room."

"No, Belikov, she isn't. Don't you get it? She didn't make it out of her cell! I looked for her, but I couldn't find her anywhere, but I found something else—a feed of some sort. Some live feed of her…" he trailed off, unable to finish.

"What?" I finally demanded, when he didn't give me an answer. "What is going on? What happened to Rose? Is she all right?"

"I told you," he continued, looking frustrated with the delay caused by his trying to convince me. "I have to show you. The feed…I found it in the guardian headquarters, among the security footage."

"What is it?"

"It's Rose," he answered, grimacing slightly with his next words. "She was trapped with a group of Strigoi. I don't know exactly what happened, but I'm pretty sure the guardians somehow arranged it. I don't know if Rose is still alive, but even if she is, I guarantee you she does not have long left."

"I…found this…just outside her cell. They must've dropped it when they—" Mikhail cut himself off abruptly as he dug around in his pocket. Seconds later, he produced…a needle syringe. A_ used_ needle syringe.

Oh, God…Roza.

"Oh, God…Roza," I couldn't help but speak the words aloud, the slightest hint of emotion seeping into my words, my concern for her getting the best of me.

I forced my hand to remain somewhat steady as I reached out and took the syringe from him, bringing it up to examine it more closely. Exercising caution, I brushed my thumb over the needle point, taking care not to stab myself with it. Doing so resulted in the last of the remaining liquid dripping onto my finger.

Slightly lowering the hand that held the needle, I brought my free hand up, rubbing my thumb and my index finger together. I brought it up even closer, narrowing my eyes as I studied the substance. I sniffed my thumb, hoping that might give me some further insight as to what it was.

Oh, God. My eyes widened with the realization of what it was—or at least what I thought it was. If this was really what I thought it was…oh, God. Oh, God, they wouldn't do that to her, would they?

I pocketed the needle and—despite Lissa's protests—ordered a passing guardian to have her taken away and looked after until further notice.

The rest of the world just fell away with that…Rose was gone. And, not just gone…she was kidnapped. And, she was trapped in a room with Strigoi, minutes—maybe even seconds—from her death, if she wasn't dead already, that is.

Oh my God. Oh, God…everything just faded away and nothing else existed in the world, in the universe. Nothing but Rose. She was taken by the guardians and _fed to Strigoi_? That was just inconceivable—that made absolutely no sense whatsoever to me. There had to be some mistake. This just couldn't be happening.

Not to Rose.

_Not to_ _Rose_.

I turned back to Mikhail, having to work harder than ever before to keep my guardian mask on. I swallowed hard to keep my emotions in check before finally choking out the words: "Show me the feed."


	6. Chapter 6

**Rose's POV (from here to the end—unless otherwise noted—it will be written in Rose's POV, that one ch. in Dimitri's POV was only because it was a necessity, but from now on, expect Rose's POV): **

_"I've given up on you,"_ the voice that I was just _so_ hoping to hear called out to me from the void. Oh, good. Just when I thought I got rid of that shit, it comes back to haunt me. _"Love fades. Mine has."_

"_We need to be together…"_ Strigoi Dimitri's voice was triggered, somewhere in the back of my mind. _"Because I want you,"_ that cool, familiar voice continued, answering the question that had weighed on my mind day after day during my captivity. Answering it with the annoyed frustration one would when reprimanding a child for touching the hot stove for the thousandth time. _"I've always wanted you…Why wouldn't I want you? ...Remember, I want you—and I would never let anything bad happen to you. I'll protect you."_

I fought my way through the Strigoi endorphins that I was practically drowning in by this point. I couldn't tell you how many times I had been bitten—considering I lost count about…well, like I said, I lost count. I don't even have an estimation for you. Those endorphins were smothering me, and I was losing myself more and more in them. And, more than that…I was reaching the point where I _wanted_ to be lost in them. Where I longed for them and that all-too familiar sweet delirium they promised me.

Ah, but of course, my conscience would let me know nothing else. Nothing outside of my pain and misery. _"Yes, Roza," _the voice took on the warmth and love of dhampir Dimitri now, tearing violently at my already broken heart_. "I did want you. I still do. I wish…we could be together." _Oh, God. I choked back a sob. That one really hurt.

"_I've given up on you. Love fades. Mine has." _Okay. Touché. Not nearly as much as _that _one did, admittedly.

"_I want to be with you, Rose. Really be with you."_ Strigoi Dimitri._ "We're free of the rules that others put on us. We can be together now—the strongest of the strong taking everything we want." _Hmm, amazing how returning the soul could just entirely turn those desires upside down, isn't it? My God…

"_No. If I let myself love you, I won't throw myself in front of her. I'll throw myself in front of you."_ Despite the pain those words stirred in me, I couldn't help but wonder if that was still true. Even if Dimitri didn't love me anymore, did he still care enough about me to choose me over Lissa if it came down to it? Not that I'd ever want him to, of course, Lissa always took top priority in every book ever written. But, for curiosity's sake, did he still even care about me at all or was it all just—?

"_I've given up on you. Love fades. Mine has."_ I guess he didn't. So much for _that_ theory. I should just…stop thinking altogether, me thinking never resulted in good things.

I was on the verge of consciousness, my mind still straddling that very fine line between reality and oblivion. The scales were very much tipped in the direction of the latter when I felt myself suddenly being suspended in midair. A suspension that had enough force packed into it to actually send me crashing _through_ a wall. My body tore through the sheetrock, coming to an abrupt halt on the other side as my back collided with the hard, cement floor.

My back hit first; then my head. My head smacked so hard against the concrete that my eyes rolled back into my head, black spots dancing before my vision as that very oblivion threatened to swallow me whole.

"_Oh, come on; get up already, you bitch!"_ the cruel, hard voice of Lucas called out to me, sounding almost disgusted that I was still down and had made no move to get back up yet.

It took me a long moment to recover, let alone actually come up with a witty enough response, but slowly but surely…I broke through the last of that oblivion and finally conjured up a definite Rose Hathaway worthy response. "Ugh, God," I choked out, managing to sound just as disgusted by him as he was by me. "I'm _so_ sorry that my being knocked unconscious has been such a terrible inconvenience _to_ you."

Once Lucas came to the realization that it was going to take me a lot longer to recover than he would've liked, he gave an impatient sigh and strode over to me. Gripping me tightly by my arms, he lifted me to my feet, holding me in place since my legs would've given way beneath me if he hadn't.

My legs were trembling so hard that I actually had to tighten my grip on him just to remain upright. I turned my head only slightly and began coughing hard enough that blood began spilling out from between my lips.

Lucas held onto me, fixing me with a glare, as he brought a hand up and wiped the blood away with his fingertips. "Well, this is disappointing," he said, examining the blood with utmost fascination before raising it to his lips and sucking it off. "I never would've thought someone as legendary as the great Rosemarie Hathaway would bleed so easily. Guess we'll just have to see what we can do about that."

I sagged in his arms—not that the full weight of my body posed a problem for him in any way; he could've stood there forever holding onto me like it was nothing. I finally raised my head just enough so I could spit on him. Not that he minded the whole blood in the face thing—to Strigoi, that was probably just the equivalent of a BJ or something.

I forced out a small, strained laugh, before turning my glare on him again. "Screw you." The words hurt coming out, but no way in hell would that stop me. No, I had all kinds of insults and threats and remarks swimming about in my head and I was not about to let them go to waste.

He looked off into the distance, as if considering that option. "Hmm, maybe after, baby." He leaned in to whisper his next words. "I like my girls to lie still."

"Sorry," I spat. "Not one for evil bloodsucking fiends. I like my men tall, dark, Russian—preferably with an affinity for kicking themselves a whole lot of Strigoi ass for sport."

"Yes, women do like a man with a good accent," Lucas agreed. "Gets them all buttery in their nether regions. I might not have a Russian accent, per se, but I do have a knack for a Scottish accent, for whatever that's worth. If you'd like, I can use it on you when I rape you to death."

I managed to free my arms, somehow managing to loop them through his and shove them hard into his chest. I used all my strength to do so, but I'm pretty sure that he actually staggered back on purpose just to make me feel better about myself. Or to make me think I had the upper hand—a very effective war strategy to use against your opponent in battle.

"You will not lay one finger on me, you loathsome son of a bitch," I cried out, putting as much venom and hatred into the words that I could—which was not much, considering I was using all my energy to focus on catching my breath and not collapsing.

"Wanna bet?" he challenged, giving me an arrogant smirk and reaching one finger out and shoving it into my shoulder.

Knowing it was a moot point, I ground my teeth together in my anger and continued my fruitless attempts at fighting him. I knew that it wouldn't work, but I didn't care. I would get back up again and again and I would fight until I literally fell _dead_.

Dodging the first blow from him—his hand curling into a fist and swinging out towards the side of my head—I reciprocated with an answering blow of my own to his abdomen. It was quite sloppy and lacked the amount of force that I would've liked to be packed into it, but it was hard enough to _actually_ send him staggering back.

The next blow, I aimed at his face, but he blocked that one, thrusting my arm aside as if it were a limp noodle. Fortunately for me, the height difference between us allowed my next dodge all the easier. I ducked so suddenly that I couldn't be sure I actually did it, and then just as suddenly, I sprung into a jump to avoid his leg, which had struck out to knock my legs out from beneath me.

Unfortunately, that movement made me trip, sending me falling back into the wall. With the adrenaline still pounding in my veins, though, I managed to find the strength in me to use my back to shove myself off the wall and back into the action.

He was ready for me, almost instantaneously landing a blow to my ribs. My already bruised and probably cracked ribs screamed out in pain, making me cry out. He reached out and caught hold of my arms again, holding me in place as he thrust his knee hard into my abdomen.

I let out a sharp gasp, releasing the air I didn't even realize I had been holding. "You still don't get it, do you, Hathaway?" he snarled.

"I don't wanna get it, you son of a bi—"

My words were cut off as he tightened his grip on my arm and swung me around so that I smacked, face-first, into what was left of the wall that he had thrown me into. All right. That's it. I would not take this shit anymore, not lying down.

Throwing the full weight of my body into my next blow, I gripped his arm tightly to brace myself so I could throw my free forearm—the unbroken one—into his chest. When that didn't do me any good, I shifted my weight to my other foot and crouched for my attempt at a spin-kick.

A spin-kick that went horribly wrong when Lucas caught hold of my foot and, still maintaining the tight hold on the arm that was gripping his, he slammed me into the wall again—a lot harder this time.

"You're nothing," Lucas finally said, as he watched me to fall to the ground, a sense of superiority and arrogance etched into those malicious features.

He walked over to me, his leg striking out to kick me in the ribs. "That, my dear," he continued. "is why the Moroi are just so eager to get rid of you." He kicked me in the ribs again.

"You're a murderer." Another kick, much harder this time, but I refused to express my pain in any way. "Animal." And, yet another kick to the ribs. "And, nobody cares about you," he taunted, with a chilling smile. "You're just like me."

His next kick to my ribs sent me crashing into the barrels of gasoline in the corner, the impact of the collision actually breaking them open. My body smacked into them hard before falling to the ground, the gasoline gushing out and pooling beneath me, drenching my hair and my clothes through and through. The overwhelming stench of the gasoline consumed me, my mouth falling open in an attempt to maintain any sort of oxygen supply.

Scrambling my way onto my back, I tilted my head back and struggled to meet his eyes, mustering as hard a glare as I could. "You're wrong," I choked out, still managing a sense of conviction in my words. "I'm nothing like you."

"You are," he contradicted, taking a sense of twisted pleasure in his having bested me. "You have no idea just how anxious they were to get rid of you. So much so that they strip you of your strength and feed you to a group of Strigoi—no questions asked. You didn't even wonder about that? It never struck you as strange that they dumped you here and left you to die?"

"You don't—" I forced the words out. "You're not—they wouldn't—"

"_Bespomoshchnyi__̆_," he said suddenly, pulling me back to reality and making me jerk in surprise.

Oh, God. _That _was totally unexpected. Yeah, I had heard of that before, but…it was just a myth. A bedtime story to scare dhampir children with if they were bad. It didn't actually exist, it couldn't—

He grinned at having caught me off guard. "It's a tonic," he explained, obviously guessing my thoughts, though I was pretty sure he was well aware that I knew exactly what it was. "Administered through an injection," he continued his explanation. "Supposedly strips a guardian of their strength and skill, leaving them, oh how you say—"

"Helpless," I finished for him, my voice sounding hollow as I struggled to make sense of that. I didn't recognize my own voice. As much as I hated to admit it, it _did_ make sense. It definitely explained why I was so off my game, why I couldn't fight to save my life, why I was getting my fucking ass handed to me.

He nodded, seeming more pleased by my realization than by the idea that of actually killing me. "Helpless…" he repeated, pensively looking off into the distance as if deeply considering his next words before speaking them. "…and now the question remains…why would the guardians do such a thing when you are of so much value to them? Recklessness and irresponsibility aside, you _do_ have a lot to offer that world. Yet they're throwing it away just like that, why?"

Reaching down, he grabbed hold of my shirt and ripped me up off the ground again, this time lifting me off my feet so I was forced to look into those horrible red-ringed eyes of his. "Because…you mean nothing to them," he said, his voice just above a whisper. Ironically, the softer tone just made his words all the more terrifying and my fears of the truth behind those words all the more prominent. "You _are_ nothing."

I tried to avert my gaze so he tightened his grip on me and jerked me, startling me so that my attention immediately snapped back to him. "You are a murderer in their eyes. Whatever good you have done, whatever damage you have done to the Strigoi race, all the Moroi lives you've saved…none of it means a damn thing to any of them. You will die…as will the legacy you made for yourself. You will be nothing more than a footnote in the history books, _if _that. No one will give a shit when Rose Hathaway turns up dead; no one will care about what happens to you."

"You're wrong," I accused, shooting daggers of fire at him with my eyes. God, I'd kill to have Christian here—something, by the way, I never thought I'd say—since he actually _could_ send daggers of fire at him. "You're lying," I spoke the words boldly, though truthfully, I was trying to convince myself more than anyone else by this point.

"Am I now?" he challenged, even haughtier than he was before, if that was even possible. He set me on my feet, not exactly gently, but not nearly as hard as he had been. "Tell me, why would I lie to you? How exactly would that benefit me now? I'm a Strigoi, love, I take no issue with lying if the occasion calls for it, believe me. But, once I kill you…the occasion will, in no way call for it. I will proudly broadcast my deeds—scream it out to the world…and go down in history as the Strigoi that took out one of the most legendary guardians of all time. Our world has never seen anything quite like you. Not exactly, not since—"

"Anna?" I provided, assuming that's where he was going with this.

"You know about Anna," he returned the assumption. The words themselves sounded like they should be a question, but he spoke them like a statement.

"Yeah," I grunted. "Shadow-kissed Anna. What of it?"

His smirk turned cold, even crueler and more spiteful than before. "You don't know the half of it."

I managed a small shrug through my pain. "You'd be surprised just how much of that half I actually _do _know, believe me."

"Oh, yeah? Really? You ever hear of Lucas? Anna's fellow guardian—to be more specific, her guarding partner?" he clarified, watching as the wheels in my head turned and pieces clicked into place for me.

I felt like I had been slapped in the face with how hard that realization hit me. "You—" was all I could say at first. I started sputtering, stammering a string of nonsense words until I finally managed to form a coherent syllable. "You were Anna's…guarding partner? I don't—I've never heard of you. In all my research, all the reading I've done on Anna and Vladmir…why haven't I heard of you?"

"Yeah, well, the textbooks aren't big on reporting on the dhampirs-turned-Strigoi, now are they? It doesn't matter how much good you did for them or how great of a guardian you _once_ were. No. Once you turn Strigoi, it's as if you never existed as far as that world is concerned. Everything you did for those ungrateful sons of bitches…goes completely forgotten."

"Guess you just bring it on yourself with all those killing sprees, huh? Kind of hard to remember to count your blessings when those blessings wind up picking off your races one-by-one."

He breathed a chuckle. "Oh, it is just so easy for you to take the moral high ground, isn't it? You really think you're so superior? You think you're just so much better than me and mine?"

"It's not even a close contest," I cried out, appalled by the comparison. "We are nothing alike—you and I have absolutely nothing in common. I kill out of self-defense—I only kill evil creatures such as yourself. _You_—you kill for the sheer pleasure of it. The thrill of the kill. You take innocent lives—you live off their pain and misery. _That_ is what makes me better than you, you bastard."

"But, it was okay when your Russian son of a _bitch_ did it!" he nearly yelled, making me flinch away from him.

"That was different," I shouted back—as much as I actually could shout, all things considered. "Dimitri wasn't himself. It wasn't him—he didn't have a soul—"

"Neither do I!" Lucas pointed out. He hesitated a few moments to let those words really sink in before continuing on, speaking in a much softer, calmer tone now. "None of us have a soul…yet, Belikov took more innocent lives in six months of being a Strigoi than I took in the hundreds of years of my being Strigoi. Just…for the sake of taking their lives. Just for the sheer pleasure of it—the thrill of the kill. Strigoi might be bad in that sense, but he…Belikov was the worst ever known to our kind. That Russian _god_ of yours got off on the kill in ways we never even—"

"Shut up!" I yelled, clutching my head with both hands, shaking my head rapidly from side-to-side. God, I did not want to hear this. "God, just shut the fuck up!"

"Ooh, I'm sorry…struck a nerve, baby?" he said, sarcasm seeping into his words.

"You," I began icily, turning my glare on him to really drive my threat home. "would do well to leave Dimitri out of this. He is no more responsible for what he did as a Strigoi than I am."

"Well, you're not wrong," Lucas agreed. "You certainly share a fair amount of the responsibility for his former state, don't you?"

I flinched. "What?" was all I could trust myself to say.

"I heard about that battle at St. Vladimir's," he explained. "There are very few who haven't. My fellow brethren took great pleasure in taking out the descendants of my former charge. Suffice it to say, they have earned quite a few bragging rights among our kind. The diminishing of our beloved Vladimir's line…well, that made a tremendous impact on our world. On me, in particular."

"Well, well, what do you know?" I retorted, as soon as the snarky comeback was on my lips. "A Strigoi with a knack for self-reflection. Not exactly easy to come by, I'll tell you."

"This is hardly a reflection for myself," he told me. "No, this reflection has Rose Hathaway written all over it."

"Great, then get to it or suck me dry already cause your endless yammering is a hell of a lot more painful than anything you could actually do to me, I guarantee you," I snapped, in a futile attempt to be brave.

I sounded just as brave and confident as I hoped I would—for which I was grateful—but that didn't mean I was any less scared. God, was I terrified. I didn't want to die. Certainly not by this bastard's hand, but…if I was going to die, I was going to die now. I wasn't going to let him draw it out and torture me with mind games or whatever the hell else he had in mind.

"Belikov was changed during that battle, yes? The one at St. Vladimir's?" It surprised me to hear a Strigoi not use the word "awaken", considering how often I had heard Dimitri use it during his time as a Strigoi, but I kept that to myself, not wanting to encourage the use of the term. "He was taken that night?"

I caught the slightest smidgen of emotion that he tried to keep hidden. " 'Taken'?" I repeated the word, unable to hide the surprise from my voice this time. "You almost make it sound like you care."

"Funny," he remarked, breathing the smallest of chuckles. "Part of me kind of does…though, not about you, per se. Just your situation."

"Since when do Strigoi give a rat's ass about any situation when it comes to increasing your numbers? It's never stopped your race before," I pointed out.

"I'm not like most in my race, my dear. That's what makes me so good—so impossible to defeat."

"Don't be so sure about that," I snapped, despite the curiosity that was already getting the better of me, as I burned to know just what it was he cared about.

"Guardians have tried for centuries to take me out; no one could get the job done," he said, the cocky, arrogant air about him again.

"None of them were me," I returned, taking on that cocky arrogance of his.

"_You _aren't you…anymore," he so cruelly pointed out, all my hopes of getting out of this shattering with those words. "But then again…no one really is, are they?"

"Meaning?" I finally demanded, managing a sigh out of my frustration.

"I care…simply because I can relate somewhat to your situation with Belikov," he said simply.

"How on earth could you possibly relate to my—?" It hit me. And, oh God, it hit me hard. "You and Anna…were…you loved her."

"One could say that, I suppose," he said, nodding his affirmation as he stared off into the distance. "Yes…" he finally admitted, upon seeing my stubborn, questioning look. "I loved her. We couldn't—we weren't supposed to. We had a greater duty to our charge—to keep Vladimir safe at any and all costs. Even if that cost was our personal happiness. We tried to keep away from one another, but that proved to be as impossible as not breathing."

Oh, God, did I know how that was. That was exactly how it was with Dimitri. We had wanted so badly to be together, to make it work. But, we couldn't. We both knew that, and we accepted it. We had a far greater purpose, protecting Lissa with our very lives. We could not allow ourselves to be distracted by something as trivial as our love life. Lissa came first—always, always. And, we were okay with that. But, that very sacrifice on our part cut our time together short. So, so short. We hadn't even been together a day before Dimitri was taken from me. Right after I finally got what I wanted…I lost it.

Oh, my God. Something occurred to me just then that I never would have considered, hitting me harder than anything he ever could've said to me.

"Is that…" I began, speaking the words slowly to be sure I wouldn't lose it. "…is that what happened…with you?"

"In a nutshell," he said, his voice lacking any emotion whatsoever. "We fought in a battle—one of the greatest Strigoi battles of all time. Not quite as epic as the battle you faced, but it came dangerously close. I sent Anna away to get Vladimir to safety. I made her promise, that no matter what happened to me, she would protect him. And, she wouldn't spare a thought for me, not one.

"And, so she did. She honored her promise. She took him to safety while I stayed there and single-handedly took on the Strigoi, hoping to stall them so they wouldn't reach them. And, apparently, it worked. I became their new source of fascination and…next thing I knew, I was waking up with a sudden craving for blood. And, that was that."

"Yeah…" I nodded my head slightly, averting my eyes from his as I continued searching for a way out of this. "My heart breaks for you." Sarcasm was thick in my voice. "Sorry you got a shitty hand dealt to you in life; I can't even imagine how terrible it must be to go through that. God, I couldn't—but, that doesn't change anything. It doesn't change what you are, what you've done—"

"You're right," he agreed, when I cut myself off abruptly, not knowing what more to say. "It doesn't change the fact that the woman I loved died because of it. That is, by far, the worst thing I ever…" He broke off suddenly, shaking his head. "In all my years, nothing has ever bothered me. All the killing I've done, all the torturing, none of it meant anything to me. But that, driving her to…"

His voice caught, but he did an exceptional job at recomposing himself. "…that nearly killed me. Anna killed herself because she lost me. She lost me and she couldn't handle it. Vladimir tried so hard to be there for her, to make it better somehow. But, it wasn't enough. Even her duty to Vladimir wasn't enough of a reason for her to live. Nothing was. I was gone…and she couldn't deal with it. So, she committed suicide because if she couldn't have me, she saw no reason to go on living at all."

I couldn't help but wonder if I would've been driven to that point. Had I not been able to save Dimitri—had he stayed Strigoi—would Lissa have been enough to stop me from killing myself? Would she have been enough of a reason for me to continue going on? I'd like to think she would've, but now that I really thought about it…

With how much of that spirit-induced madness I took, without my even realizing it, it was only a matter of time before it pushed me over the edge. I didn't want Lissa to suffer with it—not ever—so I was constantly taking it from her and putting it in me, just so she wouldn't have to deal with it.

The only reason I had defeated it at all was because of Dimitri. He had talked me out of that state, selflessly lending me his strength to pull me back from the brink of insanity before I was pushed _completely _over the edge. If it wasn't for Dimitri, God only knows what I would've done that night. Would I have killed Jesse for what he had done to Lissa? Would I have killed myself just to make the anger and pain stop? God, I hated to even think of how far I would've taken it.

If I had lost him for good—even with Lissa around—would I have survived it? More and more of than insanity was leaching into me, day-after-day, and as much as she would've helped me…she couldn't replace Dimitri. No one could, I realized.

If Dimitri had stayed Strigoi, if I hadn't saved him…I couldn't help but fear that even Lissa wouldn't have been enough to save me from myself. Not Lissa. Not Adrian. Definitely not Christian. Only Dimitri. Dimitri was the only one who knew me well enough to know how to bring me back from it, if things got bad enough.

I let that sink in, absorbing what Lucas told me, relating it to every aspect in my life. Vladimir hadn't been able to save Anna, in the end. In spite of everything she had done for him, everything she had sacrificed…he hadn't been able to return the favor. People could be there for her; they could try and try and try to bring her back from that. But, nobody could. Nobody could ever take the place of Lucas for her. She lost the man she loved—no matter how much people want to help, that's not something you just recover from.

I should know. God, this was even more like Dimitri and me than I realized. Two guarding partners falling in love, a rarity sure. One of those guardians losing that significant other to Strigoi, no less—even rarer still. But, the grief and agony that comes with that loss driving the guardian left standing to commit suicide…unheard of.

Yet…I'd be lying if I said I didn't think about doing just that every single day after I lost Dimitri. Every day I hunted him down in Russia in my failed attempts to kill him, every day after I returned to the academy, going on as if nothing had happened, every day I had to live without him…was another day I seriously considered that very option. God, I wanted to. Everything inside me burned to do it, to just—

But, I didn't do it. I never did it for a number of reasons—Dimitri ironically being at the top of that list. After everything he gave, literally dying in a sense for my sake, so I could live, it would've been a dishonor to his memory if I had given in to my grief and gone through with it. He wouldn't have wanted me to kill myself; he would've wanted me to go on living—to try to be happy. I knew that.

So, as much as losing Dimitri killed me…I didn't do it.

"I'm sorry," was all I could bring myself to mutter, in my misery. Despite my better judgment, I did feel sorry for him. I understood the pain he was suffering; I understood just how impossible that was to come back from. And, Strigoi or not, I couldn't help but feel bad for him.

"I imagine you would be," he said, shaking his head slightly, as he looked down on me. "But, I'm not. Not anymore."

I winced with those words. "But, you still…love her."

The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. My own desires and curiosity over my confrontation with Dimitri in Siberia had fueled that assumption. I had told him "I will always love you," before staking him and the last thing he said to me, before I pushed him over the edge was: "That's what I was supposed to say."

That curiosity over what he would've said still burned within me, weighing so heavily on my mind. Guess I just had to know that _some_ Strigoi were still capable of love…in that twisted, evil sense that Strigoi loved, that is. Even if Dimitri didn't love me now or even when he was a Strigoi, that didn't mean that Lucas didn't still love Anna in some way.

"You still miss her," I pressed, when he didn't answer me.

"No," he said, keeping his face and words as expressionless as he could, though I'd bet my life he was lying to put on the strong front. "I don't. Anna…" I could've sworn I saw him flinch at the mention of her name. "…she's gone. And, she has been for a long time."

"No amount of time can ever make the pain entirely go away," I said, in a small voice, surprised to hear genuine pity for him. For Anna. For the horrible situation they had been trapped in and unable to escape from.

God…I had gotten my happy ending (well to a certain extent, I had anyway), but them? No, they had gotten the worst of the worst. Not only did Anna lose Lucas to the Strigoi—Lucas, in turn, lost Anna to suicide. I just could not imagine the anguish and sorrow and torment those two had endured for one another.

Refusing to wait for him to get on with it and kill me, I found myself giving an agitated sigh, before demanding: "God, what is this? Huh, why are you telling me this? Why not just kill me? What's with the Hollywood sob story?"

A smirk twisted at his lips as he began circling me again, once again flaunting that power and authority of his over me. "This is not about you, sweet thing," he spoke cryptically, probably hoping I would catch on before he actually spoke the words. "I told you already, the guardians are letting me kill you because you have proven to be too much of a liability. With all the grief you've caused that world, well, they thought poetic justice the best solution. Stripping you of your strength actually turned out to be the easy part. Rendering you helpless, well…that's a challenge all on its own—one that a mere plunge of a needle can in no way accomplish.

"You can't fight, but that's just half the battle," he continued, when he realized I wasn't quite aboard his thought train just yet. "I could kill you right now, sure, but…that'd be too easy, wouldn't you say? I guess what I should say is…this isn't _just_ about you. This is a trap for more than just you. This is about _him_."

"Dimitri," I breathed, the realization finally dawning on me. "But, what…what do you want with Dimitri?" It was only too obvious a question, but hey? Someone had to ask it and I had no restraint when it came to running my mouth.

"I," Lucas began, as boldly as if he was an announcer at a football game. "want to see Belikov suffer. It's not enough to just kill him after what he did, what he took from me. You can't even imagine. But, it's so much more than simply that. He could've taken nothing from me and we'd still be here. This isn't about what he took from me; this is about what he is so willing to give up."

Okay. My head was starting to hurt—my being tossed around by the Strigoi, notwithstanding. Lucas was confusing the ever living hell out of me. I was having a really hard time keeping up with him.

"What are you saying?" I asked. "I don't get you—is this a male dominance show of power or something? Are you killing him to get back at him for stealing what was yours or whatever or—?"

"I am not killing Belikov. I'm only killing you. I am just going out of my way to ensure he suffers endlessly as a result of your death. I want him to hurt, I want him to beg for death…but, I will never grant it to him. I will show that son of a bitch no fucking mercy."

"Why?"

"Because, he gave you up!" Lucas shouted. "He had you—he got you back and he willingly gave you up. After what he did to me, I insist on putting him through the worst pain imaginable and I can think of no worse pain than what I went through after Anna—" He broke himself off, realizing he had said too much. "I am tearing you away from him, I am going to make him watch as I kill you and then, when he pleads for his death…"

I could figure out the rest. "You son of a bitch!" I cried out. "You can't do this to him. You want to kill me, you kill me. But, leave him the fuck out of this."

"You ought to have left him the fuck out of this," Lucas returned. "Don't blame me. You dragged him into this. You have no one to blame for his involvement in this but yourself."

"You will not lay one finger on him…" I snarled. "…or I swear to you, I will break it off." I spoke my last words through gritted teeth.

"You're right," Lucas relented. "I'm not." Suddenly, he was behind me, grabbing hold of my arms and jerking me around so I was facing him full-on. "I'm laying a finger on you."

He slammed me to the ground and before I found it in myself to remember how to struggle, his body came crashing down on top of mine, pinning me in place. "Or rather…" He reached behind himself and pulled out a stake with a cloth wrapped around the hilt so he could touch it without the excruciating agony it would ordinarily cause him. "I'm laying a stake _into_ you," he corrected.

And, like that, the stake came down, plunging into my gut. I let out an involuntary cry of pain at the feel of the stake tearing into my skin. "Let me know if I'm not doing this right, sweetheart," he murmured, voice triumphant. He brought his face up to mine so he could see the pain twisting my features, as he dug the stake in deeper.

The overwhelming waves of unconsciousness came over me again and my eyes began fluttering open and shut in my delirium and agony, but not before I heard a familiar voice—the familiar voice—cry out, "Roza!"

I looked over to the source of it and caught a glimpse of that tall, glorious form, power and fury radiating off him, and then, before I could make out anything else…my eyes drooped shut.

And, this time, they didn't open.


	7. Chapter 7

The sounds of battle raged on all around me, as Dimitri began single-handedly taking on the Strigoi. I couldn't make any sense of anything, couldn't even see what was going on. I heard the grunts and blows being exchanged. I caught glimpses here and there of fallen Strigoi, the bodies now piling all around me. Even so, none of it meant anything to me. It gave me no further insight as to who had the upper hand. For all I knew, Dimitri was already one among those fallen bodies and the Strigoi were just having a pissing contest: taking out their buddies to get in good with their boss.

But, I couldn't think about that right now. Not only because of my lack of coherence, but because I wouldn't allow myself to. I had to hope for the best. Even if I didn't make it out of this alive, Dimitri would. I would not let him die for me, not again. I would find some way to get him out of this…so I held on to whatever little hope I had left.

_Roza!_

That word still continued to resonate throughout the room for me. It filled the room—filled _me_—with a strength and power that was nearly tangible. His voice—that one word coming from _his_ voice—it wrapped around me, offering me all the hope and strength of the world. I could touch it. I had the power—the capability—within myself to touch it. And, if I could touch it, I had no doubt that I would come back from this. Everything would be okay. It had to be. God, if only I could stretch just a little farther—

My desperate attempts to break out of this current state were destroyed, my line of thought—or any coherent thought, period—completely cut off by another unexpected pain. A sharp, white-hot agony surged through me as Lucas managed to dig the stake even deeper into my abdomen before violently jerking it back out. That sudden movement tore at my flesh even more, so much so it felt like it was ripping me in two. My blood sprayed everywhere, soaking both me and Lucas.

I was so out of touch with reality—everything so severely distorted—that even my pain made no sense whatsoever to me. All I knew was that I was in pain. A pain worse than anything I had ever experienced. I didn't know whether to scream or cry or pass out or what. All I could do was lie there and stare.

Lucas already had a bloodthirsty look in his eyes before, in the sense that he reveled in the opportunity to inflict pain upon me. It was the bloodthirsty look of a psychopathic killer that took great pleasure in the kill, in the violence of it. But, once he jerked that stake out of me—my blood soaking him just as much as it did me—that bloodthirsty look on his face took on a whole new transformation. It wasn't just a bloodlust for the kill or the power anymore…it was a bloodlust for the blood, itself. For my blood. For _me_.

Oh, God. His expression took on so many different changes, I couldn't even read the reason behind most of them. Within seconds—maybe even less, considering how out of it I was—I saw the different desires, the different lusts and wants warring inside him, each one fighting to the surface. Desire, itself, was written all over him, but I couldn't say which desire he would give into: the desire for the violence, the desire for the blood…or the desire for my body.

Apparently, all three of them somehow managed to win out; something that, under any other circumstances, I would've applauded him for. One of his hands made its way up to my hair and he jerked it up before slamming it back against the concrete, tugging so hard at it that I was pretty sure he would rip it out.

All the while, his other hand pried my legs apart, his eyes glued to where the blood was now running down my thigh. His lips parted and I could've sworn his breath hitched as his other hand gently grazed my inner thigh. Slowly, tantalizingly, he slid his hand up, shoving my skirt up as he went. Once my whole leg was practically bared to him, he stretched it out and gave my upper thigh a gentle squeeze. His eyes fluttered shut in an almost delirious ecstasy and he leaned down, pressing his head against my leg. I could've sworn a delighted whimper escaped his lips as his tongue darted out and began dragging up the now exposed flesh.

I barely noticed as he raised his head to turn his attention back to me, his words having a slight tremor to them. "Dear God, child…" he murmured, leaning down again to breathe his next words against my now trembling leg. "Do you have any idea just how sweet you taste?"

His hand was still on my upper leg, his fingertips now lightly brushing against my skin. It wasn't even to collect blood, this was just an assurance of dominance…just his desire to touch me, to have me.

I shrank away from him, cringing further and folding into myself since I had nowhere else to go. Not that it did any good, since he was just as much there as he was before, still touching me. His other hand released my hair and moved to pick up the stake again. "Here, let's just end this all the quicker for you, huh?" he offered. "Consider this a personal favor from me to you, love. You should be honored. Never before have I gone this easy on a guardian."

Lucas thrust his arm back and made to plunge it into my chest when someone's hand shot out of nowhere, grabbing holding of his wrist. That same hand twisted Lucas' wrist at an unnatural angle, causing the stake to fall from his hand and keeping him from being able to reach for me again.

It took me only a second longer to realize whose hand it was: Dimitri's. I gathered every ounce of strength I could muster to keep my eyes open, refusing to fall under just yet, not until I knew Dimitri would be okay. The bad thing about that was it enabled me to assess Dimitri's expression.

Oh, God, the look on his face…It was one I had never seen before. I had seen Dimitri as a Strigoi—I had seen him as dark and evil and twisted as a person could get. I had seen him frustrated; I had seen him downright pissed off…but, this? The anger and utter loathing and disgust was more than obvious in his expression as he glared at Lucas. Dear God, was he pissed.

I repressed a shudder and cringed even further back, but this time, it was because of the look in Dimitri's eyes. I knew he would never do anything to me—he would never hurt me. He was doing this _for_ me, saving me from the Strigoi, trying to protect me and keep me safe. But, just seeing that anger, knowing what he was going to do to Lucas…knowing exactly what the man I loved was capable of… it made scared for _Lucas_. God help me, it made me feel sorry for him.

"You ever touch her like that again…" Dimitri snarled, his words both fire and ice at the same time. "…and _I_ will be taking your hand with me when I leave as _my_ own personal souvenir."

Lucas turned his attention on Dimitri, keeping any signs of pain or fear out of his features as he returned the glare. "Belikov." His words were spoken pleasantly, like he had just run into an old friend he hadn't seen in years. "Long time, no see, my brother."  
Dimitri released Lucas' hand, shoving it aside as abruptly and fiercely as if the Strigoi had a severe case of leprosy that the slightest of touches would pass it onto him. His look of disgust twisted even further, distorting the features I so loved, and he practically staggered back in revulsion. "I am not your brother," Dimitri spat. "I never was."

A cold smirk played on Lucas' lips, as he rose to his feet and he and Dimitri began circling each other, each taking on the stance of one about to engage in a fight. I watched, entranced, as they stared each other down, daring the other to make the first move, refusing to make it themselves.

"Well, perhaps not by blood," Lucas conceded. "Or, at least not in the sense of sharing blood in the biological, familial sense. But, by sharing blood in the sense of what made us what we are—what you once were and what I am…we are very much brethren in blood…bro."

"No." Dimitri's voice was harder and more insistent than I had ever heard it before.

"Hey, I'm not too happy about this either, but you can't choose your family, right? No, that choice rests entirely in the hands of fate. Neither of us can control that any more than we can control our need for blood."

"I don't have that need anymore," Dimitri snapped. "I don't have it and I don't want it. I will never have it again."

"Yeah, that's right; I forgot. Our little—or rather," Lucas chuckled. "_big_—Belikov had himself a little trip to the doctor, right? And, what happened to you? What, he put a plastic cone on your head? Shoved a thermometer up your ass? Made you a real boy again? Do me a favor: don't ever let me go that doc. Have enough problems in my life without the added pain-in-the-ass of a damn soul. I don't have it and I don't want it. I will never have it again."

"You're right about that," Dimitri said acidly. "You won't. I'm going to see to that. You don't deserve a soul after everything you did."

"Yeah? And, what makes you so special, huh? You were just as bad as me—hell, even worse than me, I'd say. Yet you get the reward? You get called the hero? The miracle?" Lucas scoffed. "If only those people knew half the things you had done…my sins seem kind of pale in comparison, wouldn't you say?"

When he didn't answer, Lucas continued on, going into greater depth on those past grievances, no doubt to spark the guilt he knew Dimitri kept buried within him. "Like, let's see…you remember that infant in St. Petersburg? What was it, two? Three months old? You held the mother hostage…tied her up and made her watch as you tore that baby limb from limb. Pretty sure there was some disembowelment and mutilation involved too."

Lucas began laughing heartily, almost as if laughing at some inside joke he shared with Dimitri that no one else would get. "Oh, man, good times. You remember how she just kept crying?"

Lucas continued his words through his laughter. "She sat there, sobbing hysterically, desperately pleading with you, in every language known to man. Begging you to let her baby go and take her instead. I think she thought you were a Martian or something since you didn't respond to any of the languages she spoke. She must've spoken 30, 40 languages and you ignored every single one of them."

Lucas began wild, frantic gesticulations to really drive home and emphasize his words, something that somehow made it all the funnier to him. "And, then when you were done? You broke her restraints and let her run to her baby…or rather, what was _left_ of her baby. By the time you were done with that thing, I swear, it looked like an old, rotting pig that had been split open, dunked in soup, and then left out in the sun for, like, a week.

"That woman didn't make it two feet before you grabbed her from behind and dragged her off to the back room. I don't know what went on in that back room exactly, but I heard a lot of: 'Please stop it-s' and 'Oh, God, it hurts' which, you know is like music to our Strigoi ears. Poor girl, pretty little thing. No more than 17-18, I'd say. Gorgeous, long, dark brown hair, so dark it was almost black, I remember. And those dark brown eyes just burned into you. She looked quite a bit like Hathaway, come to think of it."

A curious look crossed his features, almost as if pieces to some puzzle clicked into place for him. "I do remember hearing her being torn limb from limb too, but did anything else actually go on in that room, just out of curiosity?"

"I raped her," Dimitri admitted, his voice so small and filled with so much pain and regret, I could feel my heart shattering more with each word he spoke.

Lucas suddenly smacked his knee as he doubled over with his laughter, making both Dimitri and me flinch in surprise. "Oh, man! That is just…wow. Guess you never got over your affinity for minors, huh?" He turned to me. "You must've made one hell of a lasting impression on this man. All he did for six months…was talk…about you. Except when he was killing of course; you certainly don't take priority over everything."

Then, just as abruptly he turned back to Dimitri. "I have never had a kill as phenomenal and astounding as that before…and there was once a time when I was the equivalent of _you_ in both worlds. Damn. Thank God I killed Maureen, otherwise I would've owed that bitch a thousand bucks. She claimed you raped the girl; I insisted there was no way in hell you could ever be capable of such a thing."

"Stop it," Dimitri practically cried out. "Please stop." Dimitri never once wavered when it came to fighting in battle, and it was even rarer still for his guardian mask of indifference to slip and let emotion through. But, this was the closest I had ever seen him to expressing real, true emotion or weakness.

He kept his eyes averted from mine, despite my attempts to meet his in my desperation to hold onto that gaze. That gaze was all I had that kept me anchored to reality. Without that gaze, I feared I would truly lose myself in those luring depths of unconsciousness once again.

"Oh, my God, even more amazing still," Lucas said, seemingly ignorant to or just not giving a damn about Dimitri's agony. "You just sounded like her. That is exactly how she sounded when she was begging for her life. Uncanny, you got that recorded on tape or something? Working to hone up your impressions and impersonations of people in case it comes in handy someday?"

Now, it was my turn to step in…as much as I could anyway. "Lucas, you…" I choked out, coughing and gagging on my own blood. "…shut the hell up…and leave Dimitri the fuck alone, you son of a bitch."

"Rose," Dimitri spoke my name, still refusing to look into my eyes as he did. "It's okay. Please just—don't." I opened my mouth to retort, but a sharp look from him silenced me.

"Wow, Belikov," Lucas said, looking surprised and somewhat impressed by my defending him. "Got yourself a fan club, I see. So, this is why you're back? One meaningless, worthless girl journeyed to the ends of the earth and sacrificed everything to bring you back and, despite everything you've done…you're let off the hook? Just like that? That hardly seems fair. After all the pain, all the suffering you've caused, you get revered as a god by our people simply because you came back from this." Lucas shook his head, that cold exterior returning to him. "You shouldn't have been saved. You didn't deserve this—you should've been killed."

"I," Dimitri began, seeming to repress a shudder of his own. "was saved through never-ending grace and compassion. It had nothing to do with my deserving it. I got my soul back—I was returned to my original state. I didn't ask for it. I don't deserve it. But I'm not going to let it go to waste either. I insist on making the most of it and making it count for something."

"So that just makes it all go away?" Lucas challenged, a taunting smirk tugging at his lips. "That make you feel better about yourself now? You can justify your actions to yourself now that your soul's drenched in blood? Does it give you a happy, knowing you were salvaged from that evil state? Does being returned to your original state really change anything? No amount of good you do will ever erase your past. You can never undo what you've done. You can get back 50 souls—you can get God's blessing, Himself, and…none of it will ever mean a damn thing to you. Will it?"

"No. Never," Dimitri admitted, humility and submission in his voice for the first time since this slander with Lucas began. "I know what I have done and I know I can never…take it back…" Dimitri's voice caught, but that mask of pure hatred never left his features. "I understand that and I accept it."

"Sounds rather arrogant on your part, wouldn't you say?" Lucas noted, grimacing slightly in amusement. "You always did have a sense of superiority, didn't you, Belikov? Always thought yourself better than your peers, your colleagues. You've always considered yourself above the law, to a certain extent, haven't you? Because you were so good? Hell, what am I saying; I'm selling you short, forgive me. You were the _best_."

"I'm so honored to have the approval of a Strigoi," Dimitri said dryly.

"You should be," Lucas said, feigning insult at Dimitri's lack of sincerity. "Approval isn't exactly something Strigoi just go around handing out, as you well remember."

"I'm trying so hard to forget," Dimitri returned, his tone never changing.

"You can try to forget all you want, Belikov…but, it'll never go away. Not really. It still wakes you up at night, doesn't it? It will always haunt you. And, to think, people still insist on calling _you_ the hero."

"I am in no way a hero," Dimitri said matter-of-factly. "Not in this or any other piece."

"Then, what do you see yourself as?" Lucas asked. "You fell fighting to rid the world of evil…then bounced back from your darkest of times only to resume the good fight, fighting all the harder to ease your guilt. That's got tragic hero written all over it."

"That is not why I am fighting the good fight," Dimitri contradicted. "I am not doing it for my own personal gain or to make myself feel better for my wrong deeds. I am doing it simply because it is the right thing to do. End of story."

"And, the fact that it is Miss Hathaway who is here…that has nothing to do with it, right? That has nothing to do with the fact that you just stormed in here, half-cocked? Not even half-cocked, you weren't nearly prepared enough to even be considered half-cocked. You came in here, by yourself, ready to take on the Strigoi armies of the world for this girl. There's gotta be more to it than just the moral obligation to do the right thing."

Dimitri winced slightly, but otherwise kept that mask of loathing on his features, not faltering for a second. "It doesn't matter why I am doing this. Either way, you're going to die, regardless of what my motives are."

"Is that right?" Lucas almost seemed amused by the concept of Dimitri killing him, as well he should've been, considering Dimitri could barely stand as it was.

Yeah, Dimitri was putting on a good show of being just fine, being perfectly capable of going another 15, 20 rounds with Lucas. But, I knew him. I knew exactly what his limits were, knew his weaknesses, his faults. And, I knew that it was only a matter of time before he collapsed and completely lost the ability to go on at all.

I couldn't let that happen to him. I couldn't let him take it that far for me. Dimitri was going to make it out of this alive. If that meant I had to die, fine. I would die. But, I would not let him take the fall for me.

"Dimitri—" I tried again, moving to scramble to my feet.

A motion that proved to be quite futile, since it was met with a backhand from Lucas that knocked me back to the ground, so quickly it was as if I had never gotten back up.

Ouch. Okay, stars.

And that one motion from Lucas triggered an instinctive reaction from Dimitri, his instinct and determination to protect me giving him all the strength and will he needed to carry on in this fight. Dimitri returned the backhand with a good, solid blow of his own, managing to block Lucas' forearm from slamming into him in the same motion.

And, thus began the duel, sending Strigoi and dhampir into a pissing contest of their very own.

I alternated from watching as they circled one another in the beautiful yet deadly dance of battle, to attempting to pull myself together enough to join the battle and help Dimitri. I stared in awe, as if that fight was the most mesmerizing experience in the world. Which to me, it was.

Watching Dimitri fight always gave me a sense of comfort and peace that I could never get elsewhere, and somehow I knew everything would be okay. I loved fighting—hell, I fought side-by-side with the man. And, even up against him from time to time. But, something about watching him just…made it so different, so captivating. It was as if that fight was my lifeline—like my very survival depended on Dimitri's prevalence.

While everything inside me yearned to get the hell up and get in on the action, something even stronger held me down. Some force—a force far more powerful than I was, at the moment—pinned me in place, refusing to let me get back up. Maybe it was shock. Maybe it was the urge to watch him fight for me, to watch him protect me. Or perhaps it was the fact that I had just taken on the Strigoi myself—having been stripped of my strength and skill, for that matter—was staked in the gut and literally didn't have the capability to stand on my own two feet.

Huh. Well that was new for me. Literally being…helpless. Helpless to the point where I was actually incapable of doing anything for myself. God, I hated this so much. Always, always in my life, I had been able to fight to a certain extent—to pull my fair share of the weight in battle.

But, now? This? Sitting here, helplessly, watching Dimitri fight to protect _me_? He shouldn't be doing this, damn it. He shouldn't be _here_. He should be with Lissa—he should be protecting her, and keeping her safe, at any and all costs. My life meant nothing compared to hers. I don't give a rat's ass how much he cared about me or how obligated he felt to return the favor or gain redemption for his past sins. Lissa always took top priority—nothing else mattered. Nothing else _could _matter. Only Lissa did. And, damn him for forgetting that.

Without warning, a sudden sharp pang of realization shot right through me—so sharp, in fact, it felt as if another stake was being stabbed through my gut all over again. I have no idea what exactly triggered it, but an unexpected yet intense reaction stirred to life within me. An unexpected memory, triggering all the agony and guilt and regret and despair that I felt…when I had to kill Dimitri.

For some reason, I was reminded of all the times I fought Dimitri when he was a Strigoi—when I fought him with the goal to kill him. It was the strangest thing. I had just been fighting Lucas myself minutes ago and I had no problem offing the son of a bitch. In fact, I was looking forward to it. But, now, after hearing Lucas talk about his relationship with Anna, remembering just how much it reminded me of my relationship with Dimitri…I couldn't do it. I just couldn't let Dimitri kill him. I couldn't let Lucas die. I couldn't just give up on him like that—I could try to save him. It would be hard—nearly impossible—but it _was_ possible. And, if we could keep him restrained and if Lissa would be willing, maybe…just maybe…

For some reason, watching Dimitri fight Lucas like that—in a fight-to-the-death type battle—watching as they took each other on like that, both oh so eager for the kill, both so desperate to beat the other one down…oh, God. I couldn't explain it.

Seeing Dimitri try to kill Lucas made a wave of guilt crash over me, as I thought of what could have been. It was as if I was watching someone else….like I was watching someone else take on _Strigoi _Dimitri, not to fend him off as I had. Not to save him as Lissa had. But, to actually kill him dead.

How much differently would things have been, what would I have done had it been another guardian that had fought Dimitri that night? Had it been another guardian fighting him, they wouldn't have hesitated out of love. They wouldn't have hesitated based off of an impossible hope. They would have plunged that stake into Dimitri's heart…no questions asked. No hesitation. Nothing.

Oh, God, that image…the image of Dimitri, lying there dead, with a stake in his chest flashed before my eyes. It haunted me day-after-day, ever since the night Dimitri was turned. The mere concept of Dimitri dead terrified me to no end. I could think of nothing worse in this world, aside from maybe losing Lissa.

The images and emotions began to coalesce together in my mind, nothing making sense anymore. I was fixated on the battle, watching them fight in a horrified fascination, at a complete and utter loss to know what to do. I couldn't do it. I could not let this happen. With every blow, every insult, every grunt, I just kept seeing Dimitri in Lucas' position. Seconds ago, I wanted Lucas dead more than I'd ever wanted anything in my life. But, now I kept seeing him as Dimitri. I fought with everything I had to save Dimitri because I loved him, and now circumstances made me feel obligated to at least try to save Lucas too.

Anna couldn't save him, but maybe I could. Maybe I owed her that. She would want this, I know she would. If she loved him anywhere near as much as I loved Dimitri—and I felt certain she did—I couldn't let Lucas go without a fight. Anna committed suicide because she literally could not handle losing the man she loved. She tried so hard to deal with it and move on, but she couldn't. She didn't have the strength to carry on after losing him. Something that I could very much relate to. Something that very easily could've been me at some point, had I not saved Dimitri. Oh, my God. We couldn't. He…he couldn't. Dimitri…

"Dimitri…" My voice was so hoarse and strained; I couldn't even recognize it anymore.

But, there was one thing I was beginning to realize and that was my need to fight. I had taken everything lying down up to this point and damn it, I was not going to do that again. Not ever. I was going to fight for this. I was going to fight for Lucas. Despite everything that bastard did to me, I owed it to him to at least try to save him. I would fight as earnestly for him as I had for Dimitri.

"Dimitri," I tried again, my voice a lot louder and bolder now.

Dimitri and Lucas were so lost in the fight, they didn't even realize I was there. They were so caught up in beating the other guy that, as far as they were concerned, I didn't even exist. There was no Rosemarie Hathaway anymore.

Well. Then, I guess I'd just have to prove it to them.

Clutching my stomach with my hands, both to contain the bleeding and I'm pretty sure to keep my insides from falling out of the gaping hole in my gut, I managed to very clumsily scramble to my feet. It certainly wasn't easy. My legs were wobbly, trembling beneath me and struggling to support my weight.

Nonetheless, though, I managed to look quite pissed off and powerful—despite the fact that I was very much on the verge of falling unconscious yet again.

"Dimitri." My voice was so hard, that I actually flinched from the sound of it—not that it even caught their attention. "Dimitri…don't—do this. Please stop."

Either not hearing my words or choosing to ignore them completely, Dimitri saw his opening and went for it. So quickly that I couldn't really process what happened, Dimitri's hand shot out before I had the chance to make any further attempts to stop him. Panic began to settle in, and right as Dimitri the stake bit into Lucas' heart, all that could be heard was my voice crying out: "Dimitri, no, wait! Don't!"

And, like that, Lucas' body fell limp before crumbling to the ground at Dimitri's feet. The whole world stood still—time itself seeming incapable of moving forward at all—as Dimitri glared down at Lucas, that same power and fury that fueled him during the fight radiating off of him. It was so intense, so powerful, that I felt I was drowning in it. It was as if the world would explode at any second now.

I fell to my knees, as I stared at the fallen body, wide-eyed, mouth agape, frozen in a state of shock. I didn't…I didn't know what to do, where to go from here. As I looked at that body, I kept seeing Dimitri lying there. Seeing Dimitri dead. Not Strigoi dead, but dead-dead. Oh, God. What would I have done? How would I have survived it, had it been Dimitri there right now? Had it been Dimitri in Lucas' place, nothing would've ever been okay ever again. No, I would've praying for death, begging and pleading with Lucas to put me out of my misery. I never would've been able to go on—losing him the first time was more than agonizing enough. No way I could survive it twice.

"Rose…" I heard my voice being called somewhere in the distance. "…can you hear me?" The voice was slurring and distorted. "It's okay now. Everything's going to be okay. It's over. You're going to be fine. Roza…?" the voice continued when I didn't respond.

"You…killed him," I managed to choke out, still frozen in place, refusing to look towards the source of the voice.

I felt a gentle hand close around my shoulder and give me a small, reassuring squeeze. "Yes," the voice assured me. "I killed him. He's dead now—it's all over."

"You killed him!" I nearly shouted, looking to him now in my anger and outrage. Now, I rose to my feet, not even needing to fight my through it to do so. My rage was more than enough to get me to my feet just fine.

"Rose?" Dimitri's eyes met mine, confusion clearly etched into his features as he finally allowed himself a good look at me. "I…I think you're confused?"

"You son of a bitch; you killed him!" I cried out again, as I began uselessly slamming my fists into his chest. "You son of a bitch!"

I didn't know what else to do, but I felt like I had to do something. I couldn't just let this go—he killed him. He _killed_ Anna's Dimitri. How could anyone live with themselves after doing such a thing?

"You bastard, you son of a bitch!" I continued yelling, as hot tears began brimming in my eyes, threatening to spill over. But, I wouldn't let them. God, I wouldn't let them. "You killed him! You killed him! How could you?"

"Rose! Rose!" Dimitri tried to restrain me without hurting me, trying to grab hold of my wrists in order to stop me, but I was out of control. I wasn't so easy for him to stop when I was like this—not unless he was willing to use all of his strength against me. "Roza, please stop!" he tried again.

But, I wasn't listening. I was consumed by my rage, my agony, my guilt…how could I have let that happen? How could I have let him kill Lucas like that? He didn't even give him a chance, he just _killed_ him.

I don't know how long we stood there like that—me, fighting against him; him, trying to restrain me—but it came to a sudden, abrupt halt when Dimitri finally pulled his fist back and thrust it hard into my jaw. Incidentally, the exact same place that Lucas had just backhanded me, mere moments ago. The impact was hard enough to knock me over, my back slamming so hard enough against the ground that, even through my shirt, I could feel the skin break.

This time, both of us were frozen in a state of shock. I reached up to clutch my jaw, staring up at him and wallowing in my helplessness and self-pity. He returned my stare, but his, I couldn't really decipher. There was definite regret and concern and guilt lingering there—despite his attempts to keep it hidden. I think he was just as shocked as I was that he did that. I don't think he meant to hit me so hard—he was just trying to stop me and that was the only way he could get through to me. That was the only way to snap me back to reality and bring me back to myself.

But, there was something else too in his eyes. Something more than just simple regret for what he did. It was almost like he was in disbelief. Like he was utterly and completely appalled with himself for hitting me. I remembered our conversation where he told me his father used to beat up his mom and his expression suddenly made sense to me. He was fucking pissed off at himself, obviously remembering some distant memory where he had witnessed his parents in a similar position.

"Roza…" his voice cracked slightly with emotion, as that very emotion distorted his features and he reached forward to touch me.

I flinched back with that motion, wanting to avoid his touch. I didn't want him to touch me, not after—not after what he did. Not after everything. Not right now. More than that, there was some small part of me that was almost scared to have him touch me.

"I'm sorry," he tried again, his voice even more strained than before. "I didn't mean…" he trailed off, clearly at a loss to know what to say.

I just stared at him for a long moment, sharing that very loss with him. "Are—are you okay?" he finally managed to choke out, neither one of us moving for what seemed like forever.

I tried to scoff, but it came out sounding more like a strangled cough, all things considered. "Thought it didn't matter," I said, my voice cool, but otherwise completely without emotion.

"What?" was all he could bring himself to say.

"Since when is my well-being of _any_ concern to you," I snapped. Or tried to, anyway. "Love fades, remember? And, apparently yours…most certainly has…"

Anything else I might've said was cut off by my eyelids drooping shut for what seemed like the millionth time and every muscle in my body going limp. I toppled over, landing at an awkward angle on my side before falling completely unconscious…

…and before I knew it, those luring depths of unconsciousness claimed me again, continuing its endless torment and power over me, seeming to take a guilty pleasure of its own in my misery.


	8. Chapter 8

**OK, it took me THIS long to realize just how screwed up that one part with Dimitri was-I wrote this at like 4 in the morning and I was dead tired and this is what happens when Tiffy writes when she's tired: she makes no sense. LOL. I'll bold the part I rewrote and you guys can go and read the ACTUAL. FOR REAL. CHAPTER. lol Sorry I screwed it up so bad, and for those of you wondering, my computer's part just got in and installation's gonna take a couple weeks so updating's gonna take quite a while longer. I am so very, very sorry for that, but I WILL finish this-even if LS comes out first, I will finish this for you guys, if you're still interested. **

Just when I thought I had finally found the sweet release of death and could finally move on to the beyond…or something to that effect, I was ripped out of the sweetest of oblivions I so longed for. By none other than that damn voice saying those damn words, making me actually want to rip out _his_ damn vocal cords and strangle the son of a bitch to death with them.

"I've given up on you." Mm-hm. "Love fades." Yep. What else? "Mine has." And, bingo. Would you look at that; I called it.

Before I had the chance to react to those words again, another painful memory was coming to me—each word uttered by that voice slowly tearing me apart. "You're beautiful in battle. Like an avenging angel come to deliver the justice of heaven." Yeah? Well, keep this shit up, and I won't be _quite_ so beautiful the next time we meet in battle, believe me.

"You have to stop this." The hard, cooler edge of the Strigoi voice melted away, replaced by the fierceness and warmth and affection of the dhampir voice. "You aren't afraid of throwing yourself in the path of danger, but you're terrified of letting anyone in…You're wild and impulsive, but at the end of the day, you're one of the strongest people I know."

"I've given up on you. Love fades. Mine has." Okay, point taken.

"You. Are. Amazing…" he spoke, beaming with pride despite his frustration, before almost immediately switching to yet another memory. "We could be together forever."

"You saved me. Your love saved me, Roza. You brought me back so that we could be together…Your love was too strong. Our love was too strong. Not even the undead could keep us apart."

"I've given up on you." Oh, my God, shut the fuck up already, huh? "Love fades." Yeah, yeah, I heard you the first thousand times. "Mine has." Hmm, imagine that.

"You're still as beautiful as I remember, Roza. Not that I should have expected anything different…You still stay beautiful, even after sleeping and fighting."

"You are so beautiful, it hurts me sometimes…Rose, how could I forget being naked with someone as beautiful as you? ...You're burned into my mind forever. There is nothing, nothing in this world that can change that." Even in my unconsciousness, _that_ made me flinch.

God, I couldn't help but wonder—even in my agony—if I still had that effect on him. Not that I liked the idea of hurting him by any means, but it would've been nice to know that he still thought of me as beautiful. Even if he didn't necessarily love me anymore.

"I've given up on you." Okay, was this God's way of telling me he didn't or something? Because smiting me with lightning to get His point across would be a hell of a lot less painful. "Love fades." And, the pain just kept coming. "Mine has." Okay, I get the gist already.

And, in some twisted, final attempt to see my heart completely torn to shreds, his voice spoke _the_ words: "You're strong—you're so, so strong." I held my breath. "It's why I love you…" I couldn't help the small cry of pain that escaped me with those words. "I love you, Roza…"

I waited to hear the inevitable words that followed. "I've given up on you. Love fades. Mine has." But, they never came. Or maybe I was just really…you know, dead. Wouldn't surprise me. I felt no more pain, no more dizziness or wooziness. No more delirium or oblivion. There was just…nothing. It was as if I no longer existed—as if _nothing_ existed anymore.

I waited. And, I waited.

And, nothing.

Oh, God. Was I really…? Could it be that easy? I didn't see a light or a tunnel or a dude in white robes, waiting by the pearly gates to greet me or whatever. Of course, I was pretty sure that was just some crap-ass lie to get people not to fear death, but that was just me. What can I say? I'm a natural-born pessimist. Sue me.

Huh. Damn. Well, things weren't looking good for me at this point. Maybe it had all been some really hard-core, intense dream or something. Or maybe it was just…yeah, I got nothing. I had no idea what the hell it was. Oh, well. Either way, even if I did go out, at least I didn't remember anything really. I don't remember any unbearable pain or torment or terror or any cause for alarm, for that matter. So, at least I didn't suffer…or rather, at least I didn't suffer any more than…what? I'd expected?

Guess I really was dead. Yeah, well. My condolences, I guess. Nothing to be done about it now. Right?

"Rose?" a distant voice called out to me in the oblivion, breaking through the void to get through to me.

Ugh, damn it. Shit. So much for being dead. Just when I thought I had my peaceful, serene death—or as peaceful and serene a death as a guardian could get that it is—it gets ripped away from me and I'm forced back into my body (assuming of course my soul had actually left my body. I wasn't sure how that whole system worked exactly, but I felt pretty damn certain I didn't want to know how that whole system worked.) Ugh, dear God. Can't a girl ever die in peace around here? It's like the man got off on my torment or something.

"Rose?" the voice started to come into focus now, as I was slowly but surely stripped of that void that had been smothering me up till now. "Rose, are you with me?"

I fought it as much as I could. God, I so did not want to come back. I didn't—I just—I was done. I wanted it to be over, by this point. I wanted out. I served my purpose. I played the dutiful guardian; I did what I was told and what did I get? I got betrayed. I got fed to a group of Strigoi as an easy way to dispose of me and get me out of their lives.

Plus, I knew for a fact Dimitri didn't want me anymore—the self-righteous bastard. He was too busy falling all over Lissa's feet, ready to be her damn lap dog. Lissa having Dimitri as well as having Christian and Adrian, they could move on without me. They could get each other through it—they'd be perfectly fine in time. No one would miss me. It'd be as if I never existed…and I got to be at peace in this scenario, so it worked out ideally for me.

But, no. Nope. Stupid son of a bitch just couldn't let me go. Apparently, God wasn't the only one who got off on my endless torment and misery. No, Dimitri seemed to get his own little happy from it as well. My life was just so amusing, wasn't it? God, what a dick.

"Rose," the voice repeated, harder this time. Firm and full of authority, but it still held unspoken concern and affection for me. But, I chose to ignore that. It didn't exist, as far as I was concerned. He didn't _get_ to care about me, not after what he did to me. "Rose, answer me."

He swore in Russian before continuing his pleas to get through to me, a note of desperation to his voice. "Rose, please." Suddenly, his hands were on my face, cupping my face and frantically roaming about—doing everything he could from smoothing down my hair to shaking me slightly in his attempts to rouse me to consciousness. "Open your eyes."

I began to stir, those waves of consciousness lifting and reality starting to settle back in as I realized what was happening and what I had gone through.

"Rose?" I could practically see Dimitri straightening up in his anticipation, his voice taking on a whole new eagerness it didn't have before. "Rose, can you hear me? Roza?"

My eyes fluttered open…and to my disappointment, they did not close again this time. Shit. Cue the jerk off session for my pain in 5, 4, 3, 2…1.

Looking around the room, the first thing I noticed was the unfamiliar environment. I wasn't in the infirmary, which was a shock, considering every piece of me felt like I should be. I wasn't back in the jail cell, which surprised me since their mission to kill the fugitive didn't quite go over as planned. And, I wasn't back in my old room—I definitely would've recognized that. No, this…this was different. New. And, yet…it too held a sense of warmth and familiarity and an almost homey feel to it in the sense that it reminded me of…

Dimitri.

There he was. Hovering over me, concern etched into features, despite his attempts to hide it. I caught a glimpse of that concern before he could recompose his features to keep that guardian mask maintained.

Hmm. Guess we were in his room or something, considering it was a room I had never seen before and he was the only one here with me. Further examination confirmed just as much as I began recognizing _him_ throughout the room. The tidiness—even among the clutteredness—that just screamed Dimitri.

I recognized several of his belongings, randomly strewn about the room. A couple of his old, battered western novels sat on the dresser, the nightstand—even a couple lying on the floor, something that surprised me. Usually, he was more organized than just letting his beloved books lie so haphazardly on the floor like that. That stupid brown duster lying draped over a chair was what did it for me, letting me know once and for all that I was in Dimitri's room. Lying on _his_ bed. Under the covers. Oh, God, I liked the direction of this already.

Fixing my gaze on Dimitri, I noticed something. His face was quite similar—though, not exactly identical—to the expression he wore the night I had lost myself to spirit's madness. When I was raging, fighting so desperately against him so that I could go after Jesse for what he did to Lissa. When he held me down on the bed, keeping me locked in place with the press of his body against my own, having to rely on all of his strength to keep me restrained.

And, there it was. I found my ammo to use against him. Trying to hide my smirk, I mumbled as coherently as I could manage, "Well, comrade…not for nothing, but last time you looked at me like that, I got laid." I winked. Though, I'm not sure I even actually winked, considering my eyes were still trying to close on me, so it was a real bitch to remember how to keep one open.

"How are you feeling?" he asked, ignoring my comment.

I managed to breathe a small chuckle, as I narrowed my eyes accusingly at him. "You even care?" I choked out, my voice quite hoarse and raspy.

"I care," he answered, his voice and expression as emotionless as it always was. "I care a lot. How are you feeling?" he repeated the words, no doubt trying to avoid _that_ particular topic altogether.

"Like I just did mushrooms and got eaten by a bear," I replied, seeing no harm in giving that answer. It got my point across: I hurt like hell, but I wasn't going to sit here bitching about it.

Even he couldn't help a small smirk at that. "Yeah, that sounds about right."

"No," I contradicted, as I struggled my way through sitting up. He reached forward to help me, but I swatted his hand away, not wanting him anywhere in the vicinity of me right now. "There is nothing about any of this that is right," I further clarified, in answer to his curious expression.

"I couldn't agree more," he said, that curiosity never completely leaving his features.

I bit my lip to keep from scoffing at that. "Rendering me helpless and dropping me in a Strigoi nest is not what I was referring to."

"Then what?" Dimitri's voice was so soft, so gentle almost, that I felt kind of bad about what I was about to do.

Bitching him out after he just got his ass kicked by a bunch of Strigoi hell-bent on revenge against him probably wasn't what he needed right now…but tough. It's what he was gonna get. Cause I never got my two cents in all this and I still had a major bone to pick with him, myself.

"You," I said simply. "I don't get you. First, you tell me you can never love me and want nothing more to do with me…then you come charging in on some suicide mission to save my ass? You could've gotten yourself killed; you realize that, don't you? I mean…God, are you…are you out of your fucking mind?" I wasn't exactly yelling quite yet, but God, I had every urge to.

He gave an almost careless shrug. "Yeah, well. Maybe I am. Even if I had gotten myself killed, either way, it wouldn't have mattered, Rose. I wasn't going to let anything happen to you."

"What you did was stupid," I said matter-of-factly. "There was once a time where you would've scolded _me_ for such reckless behavior. And now, what, we've switched places?"

"Guess so," he said, in that same careless tone he used before, giving no thought whatsoever to his own safety.

"No," I said, voice hard enough to actually make him wince slightly and look to me in surprise.

I don't think he expected me to be so bold, considering my current circumstances. Oh, God, did he have another thing coming if he even deluded himself to such thinking. Didn't he know me but at all? He knew me better than anyone—he knew perfectly well what I was capable of. This was nothing compared to my usual behavior.

"You don't get to do that. You can't just flip a switch. After what you did…" I shook my head in my frustration. "You don't get to give a rat's ass about me."

"I don't?" he asked, attempting to put on the careless air again, but it came out more confused than anything else. Realizing I was serious, he gave a small, nervous chuckle and said, "You really think I have a choice in the matter?"

When I didn't answer, he tried again. "Rose, look at me." I did. "Just because I don't—I might not…" He trailed off, giving a weary sigh, at a total loss for words.

"Regardless of whatever might or might not have happened between us," he explained, "I still care about you. I do. More than you realize. I can't be _with_ you like that…not anymore, not after everything that's…" This time, his sigh was almost frustrated. "…but, you still do mean a lot to me. I was your teacher, Rose, no matter what happens, a part of me will always care about you to a certain extent. That's something that, I assure you, will never change."

"You…" I began, shaking my head angrily as I glared at him. "…are one pathetic….dumb, spineless dick, you know that?"

He flinched, whether at my profanity or my tone of voice, I couldn't be sure. "What?" he asked, keeping his eyes glued to mine. No doubt to read the answer behind them as he always had.

"You so don't get it, do you?" I said, with appalled laughter.

"Get what?"

"Anything!" I exclaimed. "For starters, if you're going to keep being like this, then maybe I didn't want to be saved."

"As if I was just going to sit there and let those Strigoi—"

"Yeah, and why the hell not exactly?" I demanded, cutting him off once I saw where he was going with this. "It'd make things so much easier for you, wouldn't it? You wanted me out of your life. That was your ticket right there to getting me out of your life for good."

He stared at me a long moment before actually answering, choosing his words carefully before speaking them. "I wanted you out of my life…" he relented. "But not like that. Never like that."

"Well, like how then? What, figured you'd get your rocks off by breaking my heart again first? God forbid you just do the easy thing and let those bastards kill me. No, not you. No, you've gotta make sure I'm utterly and completely destroyed—suffering endlessly, drowning in my misery—just to get your happy first, don't you?"

"No," Dimitri answered, his voice somewhat strained as if he was struggling with a decision, even as he spoke. "It wasn't like that, Rose. I would never—I never wanted to hurt you," he tried to explain. "But, I had to. I didn't have a choice after what I did."

"You always have a choice," I said, my voice cold as ice. "You just picked the easy choice—you took the easy way out."

"You are seriously mistaken if you think, for one minute, that choice was easy for me," he said. His tone was almost a perfect match for mine, only his still held a sense of gentleness and compassion for me, considering what I had just gone through. "There _was_ no easy way out of this—there was no way out of anything, period."

"How about instead of hiding out and feeling sorry for yourself you actually dealt with your mistakes, huh? You ever think about that? You own up to your mistakes and you face the consequences, head-on. You make up for what you did by making things right. You can't escape anything you've done, Dimitri. It's done. Nothing to be done about it now—you can't change anything."

He grimaced, trying desperately—and failing miserably—to mask his pain from me. "Why are you saying this to me?"

"Because I am trying to make you understand!" I snapped. "You can't just sit back and hope it goes away, Dimitri. It's not going anywhere, believe me. It's always going to be there, whether you like it or not. And, you're not making anything better for anybody by pushing me away. I tried to help you—I wanted so badly to help you and you wouldn't let me."

"Because there was no help for me, Rose," he said, his voice so pained and miserable, it would've broken my heart, had I not been so pissed at him for what he did to me. "There is nothing in this world you could've done for me. There is no way to ever make it better. Even you…"

He averted his eyes from me and I saw the slightest hint of shame behind that agony. "…of all people, if anyone could make anything in the world right again, Roza, it's you. And, even you, no matter what you say or what you do, there is nothing you can do to make anything okay for me ever again."

I stared at him, frozen in my shock, as he verbally bitch slapped me. "What are you…" I began, not trusting myself to voice the question without breaking down. "I don't understand—what are you saying?"

He still refused to look at me. "I already said it," he said, voice and expression as hard and emotionless as ever. "You can't ever make this better. You can't just make it go away by being there for me and lending me a shoulder to cry on and telling me everything's going to be okay. Because it's not. And, it won't be. Not ever again."

"How can you say this to me?" I said, in a small voice, shaking my head slightly as I tried to choke back my emotion. "After everything you…you told me. You told me that you found peace with me. More than you found in the chapel, you said." I was on the verge of hysteria. "And now, no? Now I'm good for nothing?"

"Any _good—_" There was an emphasis on the word that made me shudder. "—you might have done for me in the past means nothing now. There is nothing more you can do for me. So let me do something for you…" He turned his emotionless stare back on me. "…and stay away from me."

I made a noise that couldn't be distinguished between a laugh and a scoff, as I stared at him with incredulity. "I'm sorry, stay away from _you_?" I cried out. "I tried to stay away from you—I _did_ stay away from you. You were the one that sought me out. You came to save my life, Dimitri. That was your choice. I didn't make you do anything—I didn't ask you for anything. I never wanted you to come back into my life."

"This was never about what you wanted, Rose," he said, that frustration growing more apparent in his expression.

"No, of course not, because this is all about what you want, isn't it?" I snapped. "It's always about you. It's about what's convenient for _you _and what's easier at the time for _you_. When it's to your benefit, you have no problem being with me and letting yourself love me, as you, yourself phrased it, but now? Now you've made a few mistakes and you don't have the sack to handle it so what do you do? You take it out on me. You push me away because that's easier than having to look me in the eye day after day, knowing what you did to me. It's easier for you to just not give a shit about me than to face what's really bothering you—"

"You have no idea what I'm feeling," he told me, his voice as cold and hard as his expression was. His glare now turned as hard as mine, any gentleness and compassion long gone with my accusations. Hmm, so much for his guardian mask. At least I broke through that—got some emotion out of him. Hard part's over. Now I've just gotta get the emotion I'm looking for out of him.

"Then, enlighten me," I nearly yelled, on the verge of snapping and lashing out at him.

"You think it's that simple?" he challenged. "You really think I can sit here, spilling out my guts to you?"

"Oh, you'll spill your guts one way or another," I said, my tone perfectly matching his. "I just didn't want to ruin my shoes."

**"You don't think I would have done that if I could? Believe me, I wish that I could just…." He trailed off, shaking his head as he tried to think of how to say this so I would understand. "I tell you everything I did, you look on me with forgiveness and love, and you tell me everything's going to be okay?" he continued on, desperate to get me to understand, yet there a sense of scorn and mockery in his words. "Like it's really going to make anything better? Like it's just going to erase my past and we can go on living happily ever after like nothing happened at all?"**

**"Well," I said, matching the ridicule in his voice quite perfectly, "maybe not exactly in that particular order, per se, but pretty much, to sum it up, yeah. Yeah, that was the hope."**

**His expression twisted in what could only be described as agony and he seemed incapable of averting his eyes from mine. "You have no idea how hard this has been," he finally spoke. "Keeping everything inside, not being able to talk to you…But, I don't have any other choice. I will not put this burden on you. You have done enough—this is _not_ your problem."**

I had to force myself not to scream in my rage with how angry that comment made me. "That is bullshit!" I shouted. "You are one hypocritical son of a bitch, you know that?" I accused. "When I keep something from you—like when I was seeing ghosts—you lay into me like there's no tomorrow. It was like I had just committed a fucking murder because I was trying to protect you. And now that you're the one with the problem, you refuse to tell me a damn thing. You forced me to let you in. I didn't want to put that on you, but you made me. I didn't want you to have anything to do with it—I wanted to deal with it on my own. But, you wouldn't let me—"

"That was different," Dimitri interrupted, cutting me off, sounding utterly appalled by my words.

"It always is when it's me!" I cried out. "Just because I was your student gave you _no_ right to demand anything of me! If I wanted to tell you, I would've. But, it was _my_ burden to carry, _not_ yours. This is a two-way street, comrade. If you want me to stay out of your life, then you sure as hell better stay the fuck out of mine."

"It was hurting you, Rose!" Now Dimitri was on the verge of yelling.

"And, this is hurting you!" I threw back at him.

"That was hurting you physically, Rose, not just mentally or emotionally. It was going to kill you," he said. "Had you not gotten it taken care of, it would have eventually driven you—"

"Crazy?" I provided.

"I didn't say that," he said a little too quickly and defensively.

"You didn't have to," I spat. "You've never had to with me, you know that," I reminded him. "I've always been able to read you like an open book. I know you, Dimitri. Maybe even better than you know yourself, I don't know. But I do know that this is hurting you just as much as that was hurting me."

"_This_ is none of your concern," he said, lowering his voice slightly, but his tone still ice cold.

"Then you have no business making my life any of your concern either," I snapped, having no problem with speaking up. "If you want me to stay out of your life," I continued, "that's fine. I'm gone. But you could, at the very least, return the favor. You had no right, no business coming after me. I am no longer your student. You have no obligation to me. And, if this is the way things are going to be between us, I don't want your help. I don't want your backup. I don't…want…you," I snarled, refusing to let his flinch make me feel bad for being so harsh.

He stared at me for a long moment, almost as if silently debating with himself. Finally, he spoke. "I will never agree to stand by and let someone hurt you, Rose. If someone or something is after you, I am going to do everything in my power to stop them and I will not rest until I know you are safe."

I breathed a shaky chuckle, desperately trying to maintain my poker face. "You do that," I warned," and I never will be safe again."

"I don't understand," he said, trying reason again. "Why are you making such a big deal about this?"

"Because it is a big deal!" I cried out again, throwing my hands up in the air in my frustration. "Maybe it doesn't mean anything to you, but this means something to me. If I can't have you, I don't want you in my life—I don't want you anywhere near me. I want you gone."

"It's not that simple," he said, a hint of sympathy and regret in his voice. "Lissa needs me."

"Great. Then I'll go," I said, spinning rapidly on my heel, going for the big, dramatic exit.

Cut off when Dimitri's hand reached out and gripped me forearm, spinning me back around so I was facing him. Damn it. Yep. Should've seen that one coming. I gave him the hardest glare I could manage.

Without meaning to, he instinctively tugged on my arm, jerking me around so I was pressed up against him, almost no space whatsoever between our bodies. I held my breath so as to not inhale his intoxicating scent, needing all the strength and will power I could get here.

His eyes widened in realization with that mere contact and, seeing that realization in his eyes, I jerked away from him and let out a soft gasp. His eyes met mine and I saw the same reaction was triggered within him. It was as if we had been electrocuted by that touch and were now struggling to recover from a strike of a lightning bolt.

Trying to ignore that electricity that still crackled all around us—threatening to suffocate us—I stumbled another couple steps back. I was eager to get as far away from him as I could in a fruitless attempt to squash those feelings rising up within me.

"You can't go," he said, not even bothering to hide the agitation and desperation in his voice. And, I'm pretty sure I heard the slightest hint of affection for me lingering in there too, but I decided to ignore that for the time being. "Lissa…" he said randomly. "…she needs you too."

"Well, why would she?" I challenged, now giving into my agitation. Sarcasm and disdain were dripping from the words themselves. "When she has her brave knight to protect her?"

"That's not the only reason she needs you," he told me.

I breathed a small, frustrated chuckle. "Or you either apparently. Let's face it, Dimitri. If I'm not here to be her guardian, then why the hell am I even here? I can't have you, can't have her. Chances are they're never going to let her associate herself with the alleged murderer of the queen. My being here at all is pointless. I don't know, maybe it would have been better for all of us if I had just died—"

Surprising me, he grabbed me by my upper arms, (momentarily forgetting about his being repulsed by all things Rose Hathaway) his fingers biting hard into my skin as he once again jerked me towards him. I slammed into his chest so hard, I had no doubt I would've ricocheted off, had his hands not been there to hold me upright.

"That is _not_ true," he practically growled, his voice low and hard and guttural. "Whether or not you want to believe it, Rose, we need you. Lissa needs you. _I_ need you. I…" he broke off and gave another sigh. "…we can't do this without you."

Wrenching out of his grip, I took several steps back until I hit the wall. "Right," I said, my voice so soft, it was a wonder he heard at all. "You need me." I kept my voice low to make sure my emotions were in check and I wouldn't start crying in front of him. God, I would not cry in front of him.

Glancing around, I noticed something that I never would've expected to see in a million years: my necklace.

_The_ necklace.

The lust necklace.

Oh, God. Where the hell did he get that? Last time I saw it, he was tossing it out his bedroom window at the academy. What, did he go back after we had rescued Lissa, dig it out of the bushes, and just keep it as a souvenir or something? More to the point, even better question: _why_ the hell _would_ he keep it? Why not burn it? Throw it away, perhaps? Flush it down a toilet?

I just stared at it for a long moment as I struggled to gather my thoughts and figure out what badass remark I could say next. I had to say something—no way in hell would I let him have the fucking last word.

"You need me," I repeated, my voice much louder this time—inevitably making the emotion more prominent in my voice, unfortunately. In an attempt to not let him see that emotion, I put on that I didn't give a fuck about him and just shook my head at him.

"So where does that leave us?" I muttered, my eyes finally meeting his.

Dimitri just stared at me for a long moment, no doubt contemplating what to say next. He clearly wanted to say something—to comfort me, if nothing else, to make me feel like everything would be okay.

Realizing he had nothing more to say, I tried to scoff, but it came out sounding more like a strangled sob. The tears threatening to fill my eyes, however, could most definitely be distinguished so I turned my head away, managing to wipe my eyes with the back of my hand and making it seem as if I just had something in my eye. Something told me Dimitri knew me better than that, though.

"Rose…" he began, clearly at a loss. He wanted so badly to say something to make this all right, but he just didn't know what he could say.

I shook my head, silencing him, and slowly made my way over to the dresser. He turned around and I could feel his eyes following me as I walked. I picked up the necklace, fingering the chain before finally closing my fist around the emblem.

Squeezing my eyes tightly shut, I hung my head and a single tear ran down my cheek. Luckily, my hair fell forward, hiding my face so that he couldn't see that traitorous tear. Exhaling shakily, I clutched the necklace to my chest, almost as if I was holding onto it for dear life.

Oh, God.

"Oh, God," I finally found my voice again.

The realization hit me like a ton of bricks. Worthless. It was worthless. The necklace, everything between us, all of it was just…worthless.

"Worthless," was all I could bring myself to mutter.

"What?" His voice was so soft, so gentle, it was as if he hadn't spoken at all.

I had almost forgotten he was there up until that point. My eyes jerked open with that one word and it finally hit me what I needed to do. Lowering my hand that still held the necklace, I finally raised my head and turned on him.

"Worthless," I repeated.

"What's worthless?" he asked, voice as soft as it had been before.

"All of it," I answered stonily, my voice hollow, expression empty. It was as he had just been mere moments ago. I guess we really had switched places, I decided, as I saw the desperation filling his features. It almost, almost seemed as if he was debating whether or not to take it all back. To say he never meant any of it, that he still loved me, and would never leave me again.

But, then again…almost was the operative word.

And, I sure as hell was not going to let him get that far. I stared at him, staring as blankly as if I was staring right through him.

"Everything we—everything you said. You and me. Everything. This necklace." I held it up for him to see, keeping my eyes on it, staring at it as if it was the most fascinating thing in the world to me, as if it held all the answers of the universe. "It's worthless."

He seemed to be holding his breath as he watched to see what I would do. "Roza…" he breathed, but he would say nothing more. He wouldn't allow himself to. The pain written in his features were all too evident, but he wasn't about to contradict me on anything.

I could've sworn he stiffened up as I walked by him, towards the door to leave. "Roza, wait," he finally spoke, freezing me in my tracks once I reached the door. "Please. Don't do this," was all he said.

_I have to_, some small voice inside of me reminded me, not letting me wimp out now. No. I had to be strong and stand on my own two feet some time. And, that time was now.

I didn't turn around, but I felt his eyes on me as I hesitated by the door. I had no doubt they would be penetrating and powerful if I turned around and stared into them. It was a wonder he hadn't burned a hole through my skull already.

Out of my peripheral vision, I noticed a trash can beside the door. Ah, perfect. Playing into my plans beautifully. Holding it out so I was sure he saw exactly what I was about to do, I hesitated only briefly before letting it drop out of my hand and into the trash can. I closed my eyes in regret for like a second before almost immediately opening them back up and staring at the door before me. The door that held all the answers to my problems. The door that held my salvation.

Gripping the door knob with my free hand, I twisted it as that hand fell by my side. I pulled the door open and muttered, "Worthless," again before storming out. I had no doubt that his eyes were following after me as I left, and even staring at the door long after I left. But, I wouldn't think about that.

That chapter of my life was closed…and I was on to begin the next one: A life without Dimitri Belikov. Well…this should be interesting.


	9. Chapter 9

**By request of WildChildBornGood, this ch. will be in Dimitri's POV. I originally was not going to have any more in his POV, but she asked and it seemed to fit the story a lot better than my original plans so…I went with it. ****This chapter specifically is dedicated to WildChildBornGood for giving me her fabulous idea and sticking with me up until now and to veronicat175 for her persistence and tenaciousness in getting me to update SOON.**** Thanks so much, you guys, your input is greatly appreciated and I really hope this lives up to your expectations and you get just as much out of this as I've gotten out of you. Hope you like **

**To all my other readers: I cannot thank you enough for your endless support. There are no words in any God-given language (or otherwise) that will ever accurately describe just how much I love and appreciate you guys and actually do it justice. I would not have made it this far had it not been for you guys there, pushing me to get another chapter up and to update soon and urging me on through the worst of it. I sincerely hope you continue to like it and I don't let you down. For those of you concerned, do not worry I will get our beautiful Dimose together very soon (something that monumental takes time) and I hope I do it in a way that pleases one and all. Love y'all tons and here be my 9****th**** ch.:**

**Dimitri's POV:**

I have no idea how long I stood there exactly. I was frozen in shock, trying to process everything that had just happened. Staring after Rose, I could feel my heart breaking all over again with the realization of how much I pain I had brought upon her. God, Roza…

Unintentional or not, I had promised myself I would _never_ hurt her like that again. Breaking her heart the first few times around was more than agonizing enough for me to cope with. I had done enough damage in her life without adding to it…

…but I just couldn't seem to stop for some reason. One way or another, I kept finding a way—a reason—to hurt her. A greater good of some sort. And, while everything inside me screamed to go after her—to take it all back and plead with her to take _me _back…something wouldn't let me. Some force even stronger than I was kept me locked in place.

I literally could not remember how to put one foot in front of the other and…move forward. Or at all, for that matter. It seemed such an impossible task. Could it have been the shock of everything that had happened? Could it have been the sorrow and regret I was drowning in, with the realization that I had hurt her yet again? Could it have been the gut-wrenching agony I felt as I watched her throw that necklace away?

Oh God. Did she…did she really throw that necklace away? Surely, I had to be imagining _that_. I knew what it meant to her. It meant just as much to her as it did to me. Maybe even more. I just could not bring myself to believe that she actually thought it worthless, not after…

_My God_, I thought. _Who the hell am I kidding?_ Of course she thought it was worthless. That necklace meant just as much to her _now_ as she was so sure it meant to me. She wasn't going to keep holding on to something she thought was lost to her. That's just not who she was. She was not going to wait around for me to come crawling back to her. And, in all honesty, I had no right to expect that of her.

I had given her all the reason in the world to find that necklace worthless. How could I be so shocked and disappointed when all I did was bring her pain? Time and time again, I pushed her away. It just seemed like the thing to do. It was the only thing I _could_ do.

Yet despite my attempts to make things right and sever any connection I had to her…in the end, it still wasn't enough. I still went after her to save her from the Strigoi. I couldn't help it, though. What choice did I really have?

I meant what I said: I would never let anything happen to her. Months ago, before I was turned, I had made that very promise to her when she had been dealing with spirit's darkness seeping into her and was facing the very real possibility of being driven to insanity. I made that promise and I had every intention of doing everything in my power to keep that promise…yet somehow…God, I kept managing to break my promise. Again and again, I broke it. I broke _her_.

And, that was why…that was why I had been so adamant about saving her. That was why I had insisted on doing it alone. It didn't matter if I had been killed in the process or not. My life meant _nothing_ compared to hers. I_ had_ to save her _this time_.

I had to keep her safe and protect her from the Strigoi. I had to keep her safe and protect her, _period_. Strigoi or not, wrongfully accused or not, treasonous guardians or not…morally _wrong_ or not, _I had to protect her._

The Moroi and fellow dhampirs might see me as the treasonous one for valuing her life above theirs, for being willing to sacrifice so much more for her than I ever could for them…but I couldn't bring myself to care. I just couldn't. It was _Rose_. I would never let anything happen to her, no matter what they thought of me for it.

_It's Rose,_ I repeated to myself, in my attempts to convince myself I had done the right thing here. _It's Roza_. Maybe using that name would help me justify my actions to myself. It didn't. No, if anything, it only made what I did to her all the douchier.

"Damn it!" I suddenly cried out in my aggravation. Then, so quickly, I couldn't be sure it was really happening, my body was jerking to the side in a sudden maneuver that I seemingly had no control over and my fist was flying through sheetrock. I had no time to process any of it—one minute, I was standing there, wallowing in my pity and self-loathing; the next, my fist was slamming into a wall.

I withdrew my fist and stood there for a long moment, just staring at the wall. I was breathing hard, my chest rising and falling rapidly with each breath I took. This wasn't a result of overexertion—God knows I'd worked myself a lot harder than that to achieve a lot less. No, this was something else. As I stared at that wall, I replayed in my head everything that had happened—from the moment I was changed back to a dhampir to the moment Rose walked out that door.

The hole in that wall accurately represented the hole that existed in every other aspect in my life. The hole that I, myself, was responsible for. The hole that had come between Rose and me, destroying any happiness we ever could've had. The hole that I felt had been punched in my gut since I saw that look in Rose's eyes: the look that told me she truly had given up on _me_.

"Oh, God, Rose…" was all I could bring myself to say, grimacing slightly with the regret I felt, having to do that to her again.

As if she hadn't suffered enough because of me, I had to go and make it even worse, didn't I? That's just who _I_ was. That's what I did. I sacrificed what I wanted all for the greater good. I gave up being with my family in Russia because I was needed at St. Vladimir's. I gave up being with Rose because protecting Lissa was more important. Then, I was turned into a Strigoi…and everything changed. I couldn't be with her anymore after that, knowing what I did to her. I gave up being with her because it was the right thing to do.

And, now all that sacrifice, all that suffering I submitted myself—and more importantly, _her_—to, was all in vain. It meant nothing now. It meant nothing because _they _wouldn't let it mean something. Those guardians willingly handed her over to my worst Strigoi enemies to send me a message: that as strong and impenetrable as Rose and I once were, even _we_ couldn't save each other at the end of the day.

For some reason, that pissed me off more than anything else they could've done to either of us. And, while I wanted so badly to go after Rose and tell her just what she meant to me…the fury building up inside me wouldn't let me.

I was suddenly being consumed by blind rage—a rage far worse than any spirit induced darkness Rose had ever dealt with, a rage far worse than anything I had ever felt as a Strigoi—and before I knew it, I was storming my way through the Court.

I honestly didn't even remember leaving my room, or taking a step forward at all. All I remember was staring at my wall, fighting those feelings, fighting the anger rising up within me. And, apparently, the anger won out because, next thing I knew, here I was, on my way to the guardian HQ. I have no idea who I passed or what they saw exactly. All I knew was: _Protect Rose. Protect Rose. Protect Rose._

Nothing else mattered. Nothing else could ever matter. Those guardians had put Rose through hell and now…there would be hell to pay. _I_ would make sure of that.

Focusing on nothing but my anger and those very instincts to protect her at any and all costs, I continued on—storming my way through the corridors and passageways of the HQ building—until I finally reached the room I had been looking for: the office of the queen's main guardians. Nothing really existed or made sense to me right now. My mind was spinning, trying desperately to make sense of a world comprised of nothing but delirium. I wasn't even really there anymore.

I was barely aware of my hand grasping the door knob and twisting it, jerking the door back towards me. I was able to make out faint noises here and there: the door slamming hard behind me. My feet thudding against the floor as I made my way further into the room. Most importantly, the sound of my own breathing increasing, rapidly becoming sharp, forceful gasps, considering I had to remind myself how to breathe with how angry I was.

My vision was even more obscured than my hearing, but I did take the briefest of moments to allow myself to become aware, letting my surroundings settle in. I managed to catch glimpses of my former fellow guardians dispersed throughout the room—not that I could differentiate one from the other. I couldn't even tell how many there were or why they were here exactly. I only knew what I came here to do.

I came to an abrupt halt directly in front of the desk of the head guardian—the head guardian who just happened to be the same guardian that led the group of guardians that came to arrest Rose. Ivanovic, I think his name was.

Knowing he was the one behind this—the mastermind behind the grand plan—I pointed the finger at him. He might not have acted alone, but he's the reason why it happened. "You son of a bitch!" I accused.

"Belikov," he said, more by way of acknowledgment than actual admission of guilt. There was the slightest hint of confusion etched into his features, but even more than that was the sense of knowing. He knew exactly why I was here and was just playing dumb. "What can I do for you?"

Repressing the urge to cry out in my rage, I channeled my anger into something slightly healthier. I slammed my hands down on the desk in front of me and, sweeping my hands to the side, I threw everything off the desk: all the papers, the books, the post-its, the pictures, the knick knacks. Everything fell to a heap on the floor with a slight whoosh.

"How could you do that her?" I demanded, having to work to not break down and start yelling at him.

Keeping his face as blank as all guardians were trained to do, Ivanovic rose to his feet, his gaze locked on mine. "Wanna elaborate on that for me?" he finally spoke, sarcasm dripping from his words, disdain distorting his features.

"You _know_ what I am talking about!" I continued my accusations, slamming my fist down onto the now empty desk. "Guardian Hathaway," I further clarified, even though I knew I didn't have to.

Ivanovic knew exactly what I was referring to—he just loved to see me squirm. He was just playing me. Being one of the guardians that didn't believe I had truly been changed back to a dhampir, he used any excuse to make people question it. He just looked for buttons to press, hoping to push me over that edge since violence on my part certainly implied that it was all just a trick. That I still had Strigoi in me. So, he did the only thing he could. He played the Rose card. He knew that if he used _her_ against me, if he hurt her enough…that was the only thing in the world that would break me.

"What about Hathaway?" Ivanovic returned, seemingly having to suppress a sigh. There was a certain disrespect and disgust in his voice when he spoke her name that pissed me off more than anything else they could have done to her.

"_Guardian_ Hathaway," I corrected. "And, you know exactly what. How…could you do that to her?" I repeated my question.

Understanding flashed in his eyes, but he did well to hide it. "We did what had to be done. That girl was a liability. A nuisance, to say the very least—"

"She was an asset," I immediately contradicted, now fighting the urge to start throwing punches right here and now. "Even more than you realize. You have no idea the potential and greatness that girl is capable of. You have seen _nothing_ of Rosemarie Hathaway. This world has never seen anything like her—_she is the best_. And, you throw that away like it's nothing?"

"Talent like that _is_ nothing," Ivanovic agreed, "when you waste it. Which is exactly what she did when she murdered the queen. She's the one who threw away that potential, not us."

"You know she didn't do it," I growled. "She wouldn't do that. You don't know her like I do. This life, her duty to protect Vasilisa…it means everything to her. She would never do anything to jeopardize that."

"Wouldn't she?" he challenged. "Because, rumor has it that she abandoned her so-called charge while she was still in high school, did she not? She neglected the Dragomir princess to go after you, if I am not mistaken. In Siberia? She went to Russia to hunt you down…to kill you. Free you from that awful, awful _former _state you were in?" The way he said "former" definitely implied that he in no way at all thought it was a "former state".

I grimaced at the reference to my short-lived—but still agonizing—time as a Strigoi. It wasn't something I ever liked to think about, much less talk about. "That was different," was all I could bring myself to say.

I swallowed hard, trying to think of something else—some logical explanation—to add to that. Something that might justify Rose leaving Lissa all alone to come after me. But, of course—naturally—I found none. There was never a good reason for leaving your charge. I learned that the hard way when I lost my former charge years ago to the Strigoi. God, to this day, that pain still dwelled within me, still tearing me up inside anytime I actually allowed myself to think about it.

"How so exactly?" he replied, probably knowing exactly what I was thinking. Oh, he was just ready to use all the ammo he could against me—anything to get me locked up again.

"That," I began, after a long moment of silence, "is none of your concern. _And_ certainly none of your business."

"Oh, but it is, isn't it?" he returned. "These guardians_ are_ my business, Belikov. Every choice they make, everything they do…every little insignificant aspect of their lives is my business. As you well remember, this is what we dedicate our lives to. Protecting the Moroi. They come first. Always, always, they come first. Nowhere in that motto are there any ifs ands or buts about it. Nowhere in that motto is there an: 'Unless it's Dimitri Belikov' clause."

I winced, making no further acknowledgment to my guilt or regret. "We…Rose and I…" I swallowed hard again, having a harder time keeping my emotions in check than usual. "…we made a promise to one another."

That wasn't entirely true. We never actually out and said if something happened to the other person, we'd go after them to set them free from the Strigoi state. We never had to. I could see it as I looked at her that night. God, I remembered that night as clearly as if it had just happened.

I remembered the deep sense of loyalty and affection I saw as we stared into each other's eyes, making that silent oath to one another. The unspoken vow that if something ever happened to the other person…we would take it upon ourselves to do whatever it was we had to do to free them from that horrible state. To kill them. Even then—though we tried lying to ourselves, though we tried hiding our feelings away and pretending that they didn't exist—we loved each other so much that we were willing to kill the other person if it meant truly saving them. If it meant truly saving their soul, their essence.

God, now—after having been Strigoi—it terrified me to no end to think about something like that happening to Rose. I thought of how many chances she had to kill me—how many times we fought, how many times she had driven a stake into my heart with every intention of killing me. Obviously I was glad she didn't succeed because otherwise I wouldn't be here today. I wouldn't have been able to save her from Lucas and his followers.

Thinking of that—thinking of her going through what I did, thinking of Nathan taking her instead of me…God, I just could not ever imagine killing her. No matter what twisted, evil creature she would have become, I could never have actually brought myself to plunge that stake into her heart.

No, even then, I would have felt the need to protect her. I would have felt the instinctual need within me to keep her alive and safe—even if it meant the cost of other lives. Wrong as that might be, wrong as it might sound, Rose's life meant more to me than anyone else's life ever could. If keeping her alive meant a couple of random, insignificant people had to die, then so be it.

Rose had a strength I could never even begin to conceive. As strong and powerful and invulnerable as she was so sure I was, she was all the stronger. Words could never, in a million years, accurately describe her strength and actually do it justice. For her to find it within herself to track me around the globe and actually try her hand at killing me just to bring me peace was just…God. I could never imagine just what agonies and pain she must have gone through as she contemplated killing me. I didn't even want to think about her dead, but thinking about her dead by my hand…thinking of actually having to take away her life like that…

God, it scared the hell out of me. It was almost as if I was contemplating my own death with that one mere thought of her dying. A heart-wrenching agony tore its way through me, seemingly ripping up the already very torn shreds of my heart.

But, I ignored that. This was not about me, damn it. This was about Rose. And, the horrible injustice that had been brought upon her. The injustice that I needed to set right again.

The slightest hint of a smirk played at his lips. "A promise?" His tone implied he thought the concept was laughable.

"Yes," I said boldly, not at all ashamed for what I was about to say. "A promise. You see, sometimes, when you care about somebody, you do favors for them. You make promises to ensure that their wishes are respected. We had a discussion—call it a precaution, if you will—that if one of us was turned Strigoi…the other one would do everything in their power to do the right thing. To bring the other peace and freedom. She promised me that if ever I was taken against my will by Strigoi, she would see to it that I was killed. That my soul would be freed and I could move on. That's it. End of story."

"Hmm," Ivanovic said, now walking around his desk so he stood before me. "A favor," he repeated the words, seemingly having difficulty keeping a straight face. Then, leaning in slightly so only I could hear his next words, he whispered, "I have, uh…heard rumors of such favors Hathaway did for you, Belikov. And, there was nothing precautionary or nonconsensual about it."

I took an involuntary step forward, advancing towards him with every intention to make the first move, to throw that first punch. But, realizing what I was doing, I jerked myself back into place and merely continued glaring at him. I clenched my fists down by my sides—clenching them so tight, I could actually feel my fingernails digging into my skin.

"You bastard," I snarled, my features distorting even further with my disgust and utter hatred for the man standing before me. "You have no right…" I trailed off, not even sure what I wanted to say.

I couldn't contradict him, considering those accusations were very much true. Still, I despised him for talking about Rose like that. After everything else he did to her, he would do well to never speak her name ever again. If he had any sense of self preservation, he would walk away from this conversation right here and now. Not that I would let him, but he wasn't even trying.

Deciding to go for the subject change, to get back to my original purpose here, I spoke again, a slight tremor to my voice. "You had _no_ right to do that to her!"

"We had _every_ right," he contradicted, taking a step back—smart move—before he began pacing. "She brought this upon herself and you know it. Every choice Hathaway has made up until now has led her to this point right here. The meaningless antics and careless pranks of a teenager who doesn't give a damn is one thing.

"But jeopardizing the lives, the sacred values of the Moroi and everything we have ever held dear for her own personal gain? Going to the ends of the earth to bring a _Strigoi_ back to life? _Murdering the queen_! Need I go on! That is a whole other thing altogether. _That_ is unforgivable. That is something that will never deserve redemption in our world."

"Someone like Rose could never be beyond redemption," I argued, with every confidence that I was right. "She might have had her mishaps and made her mistakes along the way, but who hasn't? Every choice she has made up until now has not only led her to this point right here…but it has helped to mold and shape the woman she is today.

"She is an amazing guardian—a phenomenon all on her own. She is the very thing our world needs if we are ever going to defeat the Strigoi once and for all. You have no idea just what she is able to offer us—what gifts and talent and skill. We _need_ her if we are ever going to win this. You want your precious Moroi to ever be truly safe again? You want to stop the Strigoi for good? _This_ is how we do it."

I was on the verge of yelling by now. "After everything she…" I trailed off, shaking my head as I thought about everything she had been through. "…she gave up _everything _for you people. And this is what you give to her! You just give up! You throw her to the wolves and let them feast! How could you betray her like that after everything she has done for you?"

"The same way she could betray us," he answered, as calm and collected as any guardian worth his salt always was. "You want us to believe she's such an amazing asset? You want us to believe she didn't kill the queen? You show me the proof. I am not taking…your word for it and I sure as hell will never take hers."

Now I was shaking my head in disbelief. "So that's it? Just like that? You aren't even willing to consider the possibility that something might be off. That she didn't really do it? That somebody framed her as an easy way to get rid of her?"

Ivanovic turned to face me and breathed a small chuckle. "Well, I'll tell you something if someone did…you be sure to let me know just who it was. Remind me to send them a thank-you card for such an easy answer to getting that annoying thorn out of my fucking side."

That was it. That was all it took—that one comment—for him to break me. Before I could even realize what I was doing or find it within myself to stop, I was striding across the room and my fist was slamming hard into his jaw. So hard, in fact, that I could actually hear it break from the impact.

And, like that, I had half the guardians in the room on me, struggling to restrain me, and the other half pulling Ivanovic back and trying to shield him from me. And, every single one of those guardians…they were now seeing _my_ bad side. The bad side that made Rose's spirit induced darkness look like a walk in the park. The bad side that made my Strigoi side look like a cheesy Hollywood horror film.

"You son of a bitch!" I began yelling again, not even caring about maintaining some tiny shred of decorum or dignity. "You son of a bitch—you did that to her!" I cried out, immediately starting to take down the guardians that were now coming after me.

It was de ja vu all over again—just like when they had come to arrest Rose. When I had stood in front of her—shielding her from any harm they might have tried to inflict upon her—and taken on every single one of those guardians as easily as if I was swatting flies. That day, I had fought without even being aware of what I was doing. I had just been completely taken over—consumed by my gut instinct and intense desire to protect her through any means possible. Even treasonous, if necessary.

Only now when I was fighting…I didn't have Rose here to protect _me_. I didn't have her here, begging me to stop so that I wouldn't get in trouble for helping her. I didn't have her here, so willing to hand herself over, to wrongfully be locked up for something she didn't do_ just_ to keep me safe.

No, there was only me. Me and these guardians. These guardians who had purposely not only hurt Rose, but handed her over to the worst group of Strigoi imaginable _to get back at me_. That was something I would not allow them to get away with. Not ever.

Again, I got lost in the battle, losing all sense of myself and all around me. I have no idea how long we were there, dueling against each other, but suddenly, a loud voice sounded, making us all come to a sudden halt.

"Enough!" Ivanovic shouted, so loudly, his voice filled with so much power, so much authority, that even I couldn't help but be frozen in place as I waited to see just what he would do next.

Several of the guardians still had a pretty firm grip on me—tugging hard on my arms to try to keep me from shrugging them off or breaking any more bones. Not that it honestly would've done them any good if I really wanted to keep fighting. It was like trying to capture a hurricane with a butterfly net—nothing they had would be enough force to stop me. If I wanted to keep fighting, I would keep fighting until the last man had fallen dead if it meant Rose would be safe and could go on protecting Lissa.

But that….that was the very reason why I stopped. I saw Rose's face in my mind and I remembered just what it was she had worked so hard for. What I had trained her for. And, I knew that if I kept this up, if I kept fighting the system like this, she would lose whatever microscopic chance she ever had of guarding Lissa. Ivanovic would see to that, just to get back at me. I could never let that happen to Rose—I could never live with myself, knowing that the reason her life purpose was stripped away from her was because of me.

But, I couldn't live like this either. God, I couldn't.

Even though I had stopped fighting and struggling, the guardians kept tightening their hold on me and jerking me around as if I was about to bolt any second now. Which, to be honest, I was. And to be completely honest, if and when I did, no way in hell could they ever stop me.

Ivanovic seemed quite pleased at his ability to have such an effect on us without even trying. All he had to do was say one word and the whole world—the whole universe—obeyed his command. We bent ourselves to his will—to the will we were forced to abide by, to live under, knowing nothing else outside that will. We wouldn't allow ourselves to know anything else.

There had never been any point to fighting the system. It's just the way it had always been. It was what I had trained my whole life for. Someone tells me to jump a mile high, I aim for two. They tell me to kill Strigoi, I drive that stake into every single chest they put before me and save the innocents while I'm at it. They tell me to train a student—to teach her everything I know and prepare her for what was to come—I not only do so…I change her life. In every sense of the word, I change her life…and I change mine in the process.

_Change._ God, that word seemed such a beautiful concept now. It seemed so exhilarating, so liberating…something I would give anything and everything I've ever had for.

"Release him," Ivanovic continued, snapping me out of my thoughts. And, like that, all my restraints were gone. I was a free man. As free as one held under captivity his whole life could be, that is.

Slowly, slowly, Ivanovic approached me. He came to a stop right before me, so close I actually took a step back just to avoid the proximity. "You want to know why we did it, Belikov? Why we were so adamant about killing off Hathaway in such a vile and cruel way?"

All I could do was glare at him—I didn't trust myself to put my thoughts into words.

He leaned in close enough so that only I could hear him now. "Power," he answered his own question. "Hathaway was far too close to obtaining far too much of it. You were right about one thing. With how young she is, she has a strength and power this world has never seen…she puts the most powerful of gods to shame. And, people were starting to recognize that. People were starting to look at her and Vasilisa as the saviors of our races. Apparently not even murder was enough to take her out of that limelight. Even in prison, the whole world revolved around her, didn't it? And, I just couldn't let that happen."

He dropped his voice even lower for the next part to ensure I was the only one who could hear him. "And, that…that was why I wanted her dead. People might respect you and revere you as a god while you've got the power, but once that power is gone…so is that respect. And, that honor. And, you're seen as nothing more than a…footnote in history. Which is also why I killed Tatiana…then put the murder on Hathaway. What better way to gain that power, that respect…than to kill the two most powerful people to ever exist in our world?"

_Which is also why I killed Tatiana…then put the murder on Hathaway. What better way to gain that power, that respect…than to kill the two most powerful people to ever exist in our world?_

Those words echoed in my ears repeatedly, a shrill high-pitched ringing noise that made it seem as if my eardrums would burst any second now. Oh, God. Did he…he killed…oh, my God. Oh, my God, Rose…Roza…

It took me awhile to process those words, to make any sense of them and realize what he had just told me. What he had just admitted to me. Oh, God. Did the other guardians…did they know about this? Were they covering for him? Or were they just in the dark? Either way, if I started throwing accusations right now, no one would believe me after the way I had just acted. Even more to it, I didn't want to believe anyone was in the right here. To me, they were all bad. They were all against Rose; they had all agreed to throw her to the Strigoi without so much as a second thought. As far as I was concerned, they were all just as bad as Ivanovic was. Maybe even worse.

So I did the only thing I could do:

Gripping him tightly by his jacket, I pulled him in close to me to really drive home my intimidation, to show just how pissed off I really was by this. Then, I spoke my next words loud enough that everyone could hear. "You…bastards. All of you. Every single one of you—you did that to her! You had no right whatsoever to lay a finger on her. And, I swear to God, anything those Strigoi did to her is nothing compared to what I am going to do you, I guarantee you. _Nothing_. You come near her again, you will incur the full power of_ my_ wrath and believe you me…no god in heaven or hell could _ever_ match it. Lightning bolts and smitings are quite pale in comparison to what I will do to you if you so much as think of touching her ever again."

With that, I tossed Ivanovic across the room, listening with almost a sense of pleasure as his back collided hard with the wall and he slid down to the floor, grimacing in his agony.

"I could never work for someone who is actually capable of doing such a thing to a person," I announced loudly, for the whole room. "Consider this my two weeks' notice. And, please forgive me when I say…" I turned on all the guardians in the room. "…fuck you," I growled.

Without another word, I made my through the room, not sparing the guardians a second glance. I stormed out of the room, the door slamming shut hard behind me, those words still sounding in my ears, haunting me:

_Which is also why I killed Tatiana…then put the murder on Hathaway. What better way to gain that power, that respect…than to kill the two most powerful people to ever exist in our world? _

Having nowhere else to go and having nothing else to do, I did the only thing I could do…I went to check on Rose. God, I had to see her. It might've been stupid and she might hate me for it later, but I didn't know what else to do. There was nothing else to do now. Rose was all I had left. And, if I was being completely honest with myself, Rose was all I _wanted_ to have left.


	10. Chapter 10 HAPPY THANKSGIVING! FOR REAL

**A/N: HAPPY THANKSGIVING! YAY, I DID IT! My God, I am so proud of myself. I pulled TWO all-nighters to get this done for you guys in time. 16 pgs, and almost 10,500 words in TWO nights. God, I don't think I've written so much so fast before. So as you can guess, I was rushing to get this done, so I REALLY, REALLY hope this lives up to your expectations and doesn't let anyone down. Hopefully this is a good enough update to compensate for my utter lack of updates recently. I love you guys and wish you the best of holidays (to you Americans) and to the rest of you, I wish you the very best of happy readings. Thank you all again so much for your endless support and here is the REAL next chapter. FOR REAL THIS TIME! LOL. Enjoy. **

**ROSE'S POV:**

I had seen myself at my peak—which on a scale of 1-10 was a solid 13.5 on the best of days, easily—and I had seen myself at my worst—which no scale on heaven, hell, or earth could ever even _begin_ to calculate—but this…this was something else entirely. Staring at myself in that mirror, it was like looking at a complete stranger. Who the hell was that girl looking back at me? Surely, surely that could not be me. Could I really be brought to this point? The point of such utter despair and…destruction? God, even that couldn't accurately describe that girl looking back at me. No, there was no word for it, I realized. They needed to create a whole new world altogether.

Finally, after standing there for an immeasurable amount of time, just staring at what I had become, I pushed through the utter shock and terror that had me seemingly frozen in place. I forced my hand to remain somewhat steady as I reached forward to twist the shower handle on to as hot as it would go.And, ignoring the screaming agony in every inch of my body, I began to strip down.

My trembling hands gripped the bottom of my t-shirt and moved to tug my shirt up and over my head. I grimaced slightly, stifling a gasp at the sudden sharp pain that movement sent throughout my whole body. I didn't look down, but I didn't have to see anything to feel the remnants of the huge bruise on my ribs. Or to see the tiniest smidgen of a scar that remained from where Lucas had staked my stomach.

The shirt was discarded on the floor within seconds, after which, I reached back to undo my bra clasp. The unnatural angle of my arms caused yet another sharp pang to go through me. This time, exercising no restraint and no longer caring about putting on a strong front, I did cry out at that. I slipped the bra straps of my shoulders and let the bra fall to the floor.

With a strained sigh of unexpressed emotion, I moved my hands down now to undo my jeans. My legs were trembling beneath me as I worked to tug them off the rest of the way and I had to grab on to the counter top to keep from collapsing. My underwear soon followed, adding to the pile on the floor. And, with that, exhaling shakily, I stepped into the shower, stepping right beneath the shower head.

Hot water immediately cascaded down upon me. The water droplets soon gathered in little rivulets, running down my skin until I was almost completely drenched. Steam soon began rising from the shower, so much so that I felt like it was smothering me. Though, it was a very welcome smothering—one that was beyond longed for.

"_Worthless…"_ that cold, familiar voice sounded in my head, startling me. I flinched back from the grating sound of it, the hatred and disgust behind it.

"…_helpless…"_ I repressed the urge to cry out again, clutching my head with both hands and shaking my head from side-to-side with my desperate attempts to make it go away. To make all of it go away and be nothing more than a terrible nightmare.

"_You're a murderer…." _With those words, I began to feel the invisible blows of punches and kicks—the memory of all the blows he landed on me. I could feel it as if he was here right now, hitting me. Tearing me down. Destroying everything that ever was Rose Hathaway.

"…_.animal…" _another blow landed to my ribs, making me flinch back again and double over, clutching my ribs as if he had just kicked them.

"…_nobody cares about you…" _another blow.

"…_you're just like me…you're nothing."_ Two more blows, one right after another.

"_good-for-nothing…helpless…you're helpless…you couldn't save Dimitri…he can't save you…a trap…want to destroy him…make him watch as I kill you…he begs for death…I won't grant it to him…" _

All of Lucas' words—his accusations—came back to me, flooding my mind and threatening to overtake me until I literally was very much driven to the point of insanity.

Suddenly, I was being swarmed, bombarded with the memories of all the blows. It was as if every single one of them were happening to me again right now, all at the same time. I couldn't discern one blow from the other anymore. They began to coalesce together, becoming nothing more than one huge blow that rattled me nearly to point of death.

Before I knew it, I was completely taken over by the pain, the fear, the feeling of helplessness that had swallowed me whole and devoured me until there was nothing left…but more than anything the utter feeling of defeat: the burning agony within me, knowing just how useless I really had proven to be. I couldn't fight back, not even to save my own life.

I couldn't save myself from the torment and pain Lucas and the other Strigoi had inflicted upon me. I couldn't save Lucas for Anna—in spite everything that bastard did to me, I still felt obligated to save him. I felt like it was my duty—like I owed Anna that much, if nothing else. After everything she suffered, she deserved to have the love of her life saved. Even if that meant she couldn't be with him in the end…

Which brings me to…I couldn't save Dimitri. Not after everything he had done for me, everything he had sacrificed and given for my sake, I still couldn't save him. After all the times he had saved my life and been there for me, _I_ couldn't be there for him in return.

When he was turned Strigoi, I stood by and watched, completely helpless. When I met up with him in Siberia, I was held captive and brought to my weakest, most vulnerable state. Completely helpless as he held me prisoner, unable to do anything to help him, to make things better for him.

When Lissa turned him back into a dhampir and saved him, I couldn't be there for him. I couldn't do anything for him. What did I do—I watched helplessly as he beat himself up, completely loathing himself and deeming himself unredeemable for what he did.

I wanted so badly to help him, to make it all better, to make everything all right again. God, I would have given anything for him. I would've done anything to take his pain away, to make him see just how strong and amazing and wonderful he truly was. I would've taken that very pain on myself if it meant saving him even the tiniest smidgen of pain.

With Lissa, I had the option to take her pain away—to take the pain, the anger out of her and put it into myself. I had no such option with Dimitri. No, I had to stand by and watch as the man I loved more than anything suffered endlessly for something he had no control over. And, God, it killed me. He didn't deserve any of this. Even after everything he did as a Strigoi, he was still by far the best man I had ever known. He didn't do anything wrong—he sacrificed everything he ever had for the greater good and_ this_ is what he gets for it! How the fuck was that fair? How the fuck was _any of this _fair?

Without warning, a primal, feral scream suddenly sounded in my ears—a roar of rage and utter agony. God, it was so loud, it was a wonder my ears didn't start bleeding from the impact of it. All there was—all there could be—was that ear-splitting, earth-shattering cry filled with so, so much. So much pain, so much anger…so much unspoken fear.

Some subconscious part of my mind knew—even without a shard of clarity—that that scream was emitting from me. And, my God, that scream was without a doubt the worst sound I had ever heard in my life.

Or so I thought, until I heard a bizarre, crashing noise in the distance that I couldn't quite identify. It was strange—some foreign sound almost like something being torn and shattered to pieces. Something inside me knew that I should've recognized it and I should have known what was causing it, but…I was just too far gone. There was nothing outside of the pain and rage screaming through me and around me, very literally consuming everything I was.

It wasn't until something _actually_ hit me in the face that I realized what was happening. I finally gave in and allowed myself to become aware of what was going on:

My fists slamming repeatedly into the shower wall. My fingernails scrabbling at the tile in my desperation to channel my anger into a physical outlet. My skin breaking as sharp remnants of the now broken shower tile cut deep into my skin. Blood spilling out of the freshly made wounds. Said blood pouring down my wrists…dripping down my forearms and pooling in the folded creases of my elbows…spilling over the edges.

…Blood, blood, blood….

And then there was the poor shower: being torn apart, ripped to pieces and completely destroyed, having faced The Wrath of Rose Hathaway:

Chunks of broken tile fell to the shower floor with a loud clatter—some of the smaller chunks flying out and hitting me in the face. Sheetrock exploded all around me, immediately crumbling to dust and floating aimlessly to the shower floor.

That realization suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks, the full weight of what I was doing and its consequences slamming into me. I stopped abruptly, jerking my fists back towards me so that my arms were frozen in midair under the showerhead. As the water poured down onto my skin, washing away my blood, I stared in a fascinated horror with the realization of what I had done. Of what I had become.

I had stopped screaming by this point—though, the raw pain and throbbing of my vocal cords definitely confirmed that I had been the one screaming. Very much on the verge of hyperventilation, my breathing came out in sharp, painful gasps, my chest and shoulders rising and falling drastically with each forced breath. I had to remind myself not to lock my knees, lest I pass out right here in the freakin' shower.

Slowly, carefully, I lowered my arms to my side, biting my lip to stifle that sudden irritating urge to scream again. Then, forcing my legs to remember how to move without resulting in my collapsing, I brought one foot forward and stepped directly beneath the shower head, in a way that finally allowed the water to soak me through completely.

Tilting my head back, I brought my arms up—despite the fact that the now practically destroyed muscles were begging me for mercy by this point—and ran my hands over my hair to smooth it down, my fingers working through the tangled strands matted to my head. I ran my hands repeatedly over my hair to pull out the globs of dried blood and dirt and grime.

I stood under that shower for a bit longer after my breakdown, just standing there, running my hands over my hair and my skin over and over and over and over again. Almost as if I might wash the whole experience completely away if I stood there long enough. If I let that water work its magic, it might erase everything—the pain, the agony, the fear, the defeat, the helplessness…just everything. My existence.

I didn't want anything anymore. If you had anything in life, you were subject to pain and I just…God, I didn't think I could handle any more pain. Physical, mental, or emotional. I had just reached my quota of pain and endurance to last me a good, solid lifetime. I'd say I had paid my dues. I just wanted to be completely blotted out of existence for the rest of time. Was that really _so_ much to ask?

Feeling like a weepy, whiny little bitch, I let out a dreadful sigh and reached my hands out to twist the knob and shut the water off. It was the only way I was ever getting my ass out of this shower. This was as cleaned up and okay as I was going to get. Staying in this shower, whining over my loss and agony wasn't helping anyone and it sure as hell wasn't making anything better for anyone.

Deciding not to waste any more time, I tugged the shower curtain aside and reached out for the towel I had hung on the rack before my shower. I held it with both hands as I brought it up to dry my face and to towel dry my hair as much as I could. Then, I wrapped it around myself, taking a surprising sense of safety in the fleeting warmth and comfort it provided me. I stuck one leg out of the shower and slowly eased my way out, still wary to the excruciating pain I knew had to be coming with that movement.

Oh, dear God, and come it did. Shooting, throbbing pains surged its way through the leg that supported the most of my weight and I had to grasp the towel rack to keep from collapsing. The world spun around me a couple times. My vision blurred a bit and things threatened to go white again, but I clutched a hand to my forehead and squeezed eyes tightly shut in an attempt to make it go away.

"No," I practically growled. "No, I will _not_ go through this again, damn it. You stop it." Reluctantly, I opened one eye and once I saw the world had indeed righted itself again, I slowly made my way over to the mirror. "Piece of shit," I muttered to myself.

Looking in the mirror yet again, I decided to ignore the utter shittiness of my appearance and focus on the…well, okay. I'm not going to lie. There was nothing good to focus on. I just looked like shit. Plain and simple as that.

I brought a hand up and ran it through my hair a couple times, both to continue my seemingly lifelong endeavors to untangle it and to help it dry faster. I had started to tease it when a soft knock at my bathroom door startled me out of my depressing, self-pitying thoughts, actually making me jump and gasp.

I stayed quiet, not wanting to answer until I knew who it was. And, my God, was I glad I stayed quiet when it was Dimitri's voice who finally spoke from the other side of the door. "Rose." His voice was so soft, so gentle. All evidence of its earlier harshness and lack of caring long gone.

I held my breath, having no doubt if I even breathed the wrong way, he would hear it and insist on staying there until I came out and faced him. "Rose, is everything okay in there?" he persisted, so not about to let this go, as I had accurately predicted. "Rose?" he tried again, when I still didn't say anything.

Having to work to keep the neutrality in my voice, I said, "Go away, Dimitri." _Oh, please God, make him listen,_ I silently prayed. _I swear, for real this time, if you make him go away, I will actually _try _to read the Bible. And, I'll actually attempt to get past the words: 'In the Beginning…'. I think that's a pretty sweet deal, all things considered. Even you have to admit that coming from me—_

"Rose, what are you doing in there?" Dimitri's voice was still gentle, but there was also a sense of knowing in his words. He knew exactly what I had been doing. Apparently, he had been standing there just long enough to catch the show. Oh, great. Just what I needed. For him to have yet more ammo to use against me.

_Ugh, what good are you?_ I quickly finished my "prayer" in my head. _I always knew there was a reason I didn't believe in you. Good-for-nothing_. And, lightning bolt.

Having no problem being at least semi-bitchy to Dimitri after everything he put me through, I gave an aggravated sigh and said, "My boyfriend. Now go away."

"You are not!" he accused.

I jerked my head towards the door, actually quite taken aback by his confidence. Yeah, I wasn't, but how the hell was he so sure? "What, how do you know?" I demanded.

"Because Adrian is sleeping off the alcohol and nicotine he indulged in when you went missing," Dimitri told me, actually answering the question I had been wondering since I had returned. I was wondering why the bastard never came to visit me. Well. At least _he_ had a decent excuse…or as decent as Adrian Ivashkov could get, that is. "…which is why he couldn't assist Lissa in healing you," Dimitri continued, interrupting my thoughts, "because with all that in his system, there was nothing he could have done for you. Spirit's effects were long numbed in him and it would have taken too long to wait for it to get out of his system."

I rolled my eyes at Adrian's turning back to his vices for comfort since I wasn't around—so typical, I should've seen that one coming—but said nothing more to Dimitri. I wasn't any happier with him either. He had no right coming to see me. Exactly _what _did the words "we are done" mean to him when he had said those very words to me mere weeks ago?

"Rose, please come out," Dimitri said softly, attempting reason again. "Please," he added quickly, apparently sensing my urge to counter that reason with some reason of my own.

Ugh. Well, I had to go out there sometime. I was getting cold standing there in that damn towel and staying in here, hiding away from him, was just giving him the edge. And, that edge was mine. Time to go take it back. Plus, you know, it's not like he hadn't seen me naked before anyway. So modesty certainly posed no issue here.

So tucking in the edges of my towel, I slowly spun on my heel and made my way over to the door. Wanting to seem bold and confident, I wasted no time in opening it. I wanted him to think I was resolved and had no issue telling him to fuck off. So I jerked the door open, only to come face-to-face with him…and have that resolve go to total shit once I saw him. Damn it. God, why did he have to be so amazing?

I took not even half a second to drink in those perfect features of his—those eyes, that hair, that face…that duster (yes, as much as it pains me to admit it, I did miss that damn thing too)—everything about him that I had been deprived of for so, so long. I certainly didn't take long enough for him to actually catch my assessment of him.

"What, you're not banged up enough?" he finally spoke, nodding down to my fists, which were still pretty bloodied from picking a fight with the wall. "You've gotta go and add to it?"

In an attempt to seem careless and unconcerned, I wiped the back of one of my fists on the towel and did my best to pick out a flaw or something on him. I did happen to notice a pretty hard-core bruise forming on his jaw from his earlier fight with the Strigoi, presumably. So, petty as it might be, I called him out on it. "I see they improved your face," I said, inclining my head towards said bruise, ignoring his comment altogether.

Despite his better judgment, I saw the slightest of smiles threaten to flicker at his lips. "You too," he noted, gesturing towards the worst of my bruises—on my face anyway. Right below my right eye, I sported a nice dark bruise that hurt like hell. One that I had particularly out of my way to avoid and one that I had hoped he wouldn't mention.

It was the bruise that he had given me when he hit me back at the warehouse. Unconsciously, my fingers moved up to touch it and I forced a dry smile. "Yeah, well…it's my favorite of my current bruises."

Then, surprising me, he moved his own hand up and gently moved mine aside so his own fingers could brush it. He knew, I could see, that this was the one he had given me. He did a pretty damn good job of masking his emotions, but I was just that pretty damn good at pushing through the façade and reading the guilt and regret that I knew was eating him up inside.

His fingers gently brushed across the damaged skin as his eyes flicked to mine. "I'm so sorry," was all he said. But, staring into his eyes, I could tell, he was apologizing for so much more than just that one bruise.

"Forget about it," I said, with a slight grimace. "No big deal. I need to learn to stop spazzing out and throwing a hissy fit at every little thing that upsets me. I'm still working on that, as you well remember."

"Rose—" he began, but I immediately cut him off.

"Dimitri." There was a sharpness in that one word that I never thought myself capable of using while speaking that name. "Please just don't. Okay? I really don't want to hear it. I've got too much other shit going on right now. I can't handle you too. Please just go."

I walked on past him, but knew he hadn't moved from that spot. Yeah, no, he wasn't going anywhere. Not anytime soon. I felt his eyes on me as I roamed about the room, the concern and worry radiating off of him almost palpably. He didn't say anything, but the tension in the air between us was so thick that I worried I might suffocate in it.

Finally, unable to take it anymore, I jerked around to face him and threw my hands in the air. "Are you still here? Ow! Ow!" I cried out, my hand flying up to grab a hold of my injured shoulder. A fiery sensation shot its way through my shoulder—an unnatural agony that made me feel like my arm was being pulled out of its socket.

Dimitri straightened up at my outburst, but stayed put, refusing to move unless he absolutely needed to. Nice. Very good. "What wrong? Are you okay?" he asked, that trademark stoicism etched perfectly into his features.

"Yeah. Peachy," I murmured, trying to rotate my shoulder to ease out the kinks, but finding that I couldn't move it past a certain position. My shoulder was literally incapable of moving past a certain point. "I think that bitch dislocated my shoulder, though. Lucas," I added, to his questioning look. I continued moving it, but it did no good. That thing wasn't going anywhere. Ah, fuck. "Here, hold me," I said, dreading the words, even as I spoke them.

His body went completely rigid with those words, but he saw no other options and he couldn't bring himself to deny a request from me after everything that had happened. So, taking this just as seriously as he always had his other guardian duties, he strode across the room to me, coming to a stop right in front of me. "Want me to get it?" he offered, the slightest hint of sympathy in his voice. He knew just how much this shit hurt.

"Nah." I shook my head. "I've got it. Just hold onto me for a sec." He obliged, asking no more questions as his hands reached out, wrapping tightly around my waist and holding me securely in place. "Got it?" I asked, not wanting to fuck this up because he wasn't holding me right or whatever.

"Yeah," was all he could say, his voice so low, it bordered dangerously on a growl.

Ignoring that, I gripped his upper arms and counted to three silently in my head before jerking myself to the side as fast as I could. Aside from the involuntary cry that escaped my lips, I could hear the sickening sound of my shoulder snapping itself back into its socket. Releasing one of his arms, one of my fists flew up to my mouth to smother off the cry.

Without realizing it, Dimitri's arms had tightened around me—he had to in order to hold me upright. "Rose?" All reason, all sense of right and wrong, was dropped as he eyed me with utmost concern. "You okay?" I didn't answer right away, so his hold on me tightened even more, his eyes locked on me as he assessed me for any further damage.

I hadn't even realized my eyes had squeezed shut until my eyelids finally fluttered open and I noticed Dimitri. And, oh my _fuck_, did I notice him. God, it had been so, so long since he had looked at me like that, since he had held me like that…I had forgotten how truly amazing and exhilarating it all had really felt.

Our eyes locked and, as could be expected, that impenetrable bond of ours burned between us. Magnificent and strong and wonderful…oh, God. I could feel it all again, all the love and joy and happiness and excitement and awe that had burned through me that night. The night that we had sex—God, it seemed like a lifetime ago—but looking into his eyes right now, it was so easy to believe it was mere minutes ago. Everything between us became warm and heady. I could see, as I looked at him, that he was replaying every detail of that night, just as I was. How it had all felt—the feel of his skin gliding against mine, the feel of his lips caressing my skin, the feel of his body connecting with mine…oh, my God. Oh, how I wish I had the words to even begin to accurately describe those feelings that had surged through me.

Looking at him now, I could see I had the very same effect on him. He too felt the same spark of that old connection and was now reliving those very details, remembering them as vividly as I was.

He so wanted to say something, but soon realized how unnecessary it was. That's the way it had always been with us. Words were beyond unnecessary with us—we never needed to "say" or "prove" how we felt. We had nothing to prove. It was moments like this, looking into one another's eyes and feeling the strength and will of that love coursing through you, encompassing you, suffocating you…and you long for that very suffocation. That…was all that we had really needed.

The look in his eyes took on a whole new turn, a whole new sensation—one that I recognized just as well—as his eyes traveled down the length of my body. It seemed to be as involuntary as my cry of agony had been. He hadn't meant to do it—it just…kind of happened. And once it did, well…he didn't want it to stop.

His eyes lingered on a particular water droplet…one that slowly but surely rolled its way down my skin, disappearing into my cleavage. He froze up, his eyes locked on my cleavage and just what they had to offer, and his look became—dare I say it—hungry. Sensual. Something that he usually never allowed to happen. It was very rare for me to ever see this much of him on display.

I suddenly became very aware of his arms around me, one clutching tightly at my lower waist while the other stretched across my back. His fingers came to rest on my bare shoulder blade and I could feel the gentle, albeit slightly passionate press of his fingers against my skin.

Oh, God. What the hell? What the fuck was going on here?

Finally, after a long moment of the pent-up sexual energy taking its toll, Dimitri blinked and averted his eyes from mine. He cleared his throat. "Better now?" he asked, and I could hear the double meaning in his words.

Okay. I have no idea why I did it—maybe it was because he had stirred up emotions in me I was trying to get rid of, or maybe it was just because I was Rose Hathaway. Yeah. Pretty, uh…self-explanatory. But somewhere, out of nowhere, I pulled my fist back then thrust as hard as I could in the uninjured side of his jaw.

"That helps," I muttered truthfully, knowing that was probably really stupid on my part. But I didn't care. He was Dimitri. He could take it.

He let out a grunt and staggered back several steps from me in surprise, now clutching his jaw with his now free hand. I had expected him to reprimand me or lecture me about self-control of my utter lack of. What I didn't expect was for him to chuckle…but that's what he did. His eyes found their way back to mine and there was a hint of an amused glint in his eyes. "Well said," he noted.

"Thanks," I said, unable to hide the confusion in my voice. "I know my eloquence is just beyond phenomenal."

"Indeed," he agreed, though sarcasm laced his voice. Yet another uncharacteristic move for him.

"Mm," I mumbled, not gracing him with an actual response. "Now, get out," I tried again, hoping a punch to the face would make him rethink his priorities.

"I can't do that, Rose," he finally said.

"Would you like some assistance?" I offered, as I moved around the room, looking through my packed boxes for something to put on. Finally, I happened upon a box labeled: NIGHT SHIRTS.

"That's not funny, Rose," Dimitri said, continuing to watch me.

"Hence my lack of laughter," I agreed.

Picking up the first shirt I came across, I left the towel wrapped around me as I pulled it over my head. I tugged it down further, straightening it out so that it fell to about my mid-thigh. This might not be the most appropriate thing to wear, admittedly, but considering our history, he could hardly complain. So I let the towel drop from under the shirt and didn't even bother putting on underwear as I turned around to face him.

It wasn't until I saw the look on his face that I realized just what shirt I had put on. It was a Cyrillic shirt of some band that he had claimed was quote—"the best European band of all time"—end quote. He had loaned it to me a couple months before he was turned Strigoi and I guess I had just unknowingly held onto it all this time. I had made fun of him at the time, saying something along the lines of: "Hey, don't try to convert me, comrade. Unlike some people, I have good taste in music. I can't listen to this shit—stop trying to force it on me."

He didn't even bother hiding his amusement. "Can I take this to mean I've converted you?" he teased.

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Not in this lifetime," I assured him.

"Ah," he said, clearly not believing me. That amusement dried up, though, as his eyes drifted beyond me and he caught sight of the boxes. "Going somewhere?" There was a slightly dangerous note to his voice—a note that usually preceded the him trying to stop me part.

"And if I am?" I demanded, in my desperate attempts to evade him. "What's it to you?"

"Rose, you are _not_ leaving," he said, all traces of humor and amusement long gone from his voice and expression.

"Watch me," I said, picking up my bag and slinging it over my shoulder to make my point. "In case you have forgotten, Dimitri, I am no longer your concern." God, our relationship was going in so many circles lately, I swear to God, I was actually starting to get dizzy from it.

"This has nothing to do with concern, Rose. This is about stopping you from doing something stupid that you're going to regret for the rest of your life."

"Ah, your life purpose," I said sarcastically. "Save the troubled teen from herself for the sake of your pride."

"My pride has nothing to do with it. This has nothing whatsoever to do with me, period. It isn't even about you. It's about _her_." I flinched. "You cannot do this to Lissa. You can't just leave her again. After everything you promised her—"

"Yeah, well, I promised a lot of things. People break promises all the time. Deal with it." I put on a strong, uncaring front, but I knew he saw right through it.

"And the fact that you're leaving her behind yet again after everything else you've put her through, what, means nothing to you? You're really going to abandon her like this and expect her to just 'deal with it'?"

"Guess so," I said, swallowing hard to keep my emotions in check. "I certainly can't stay here, now can I? I already told you, nobody wants me around anymore. Nobody needs me. I can take care of myself. So might as well just take off. Seems to be the ideal option for everyone."

"You mean the ideal option for you," he corrected. He shook his head as he eyed me with both frustration and almost a sense of disgust. "Rose, what happened to you? This isn't like you. Even if you know you don't have a fighting chance, you have always at least tried to do the right thing. To stand up for what's right; to stand up for yourself. But now you're just giving up? You're going to leave, just like that? Without even putting up a fight?"

"Yup," I said, matter-of-factly. "So I suggest you leave now because I'm due out of here in about, oh...two? Three months ago?"

Mentally making sure I had everything I needed, I walked past him to go drop my towel in the hamper by the closet. Knowing what he would do, I tried to evade his arm reaching out to grab a hold of me…and failed miserably as his hand caught hold of my upper arm and jerked me back towards him.

His eyes burned into mine, such passion and fierceness behind them that I feared he'd incinerate me with a mere glance. "Where are you going?" he demanded.

"I reiterate…" I said, voice ice cold as I tugged my arm free from his grasp. "…_none_ of your concern. You try and follow me and—dhampir again or not—I_ will_ finish the job I started on you in Siberia," I threatened, no longer recognizing my voice.

He released me and took a step back, holding his arms out almost as if bracing himself for an embrace. "Go ahead," he offered. "If it'll make you feel better."

"Get out of my way," I finally said, my voice so quiet, it had practically dropped to a whisper.

"I'm not going anywhere," he warned. I stayed quiet, waiting to see just what he planned to do to "keep me here". "Why are you doing this, Rose?" he finally asked. "Don't lie to me. Please just tell me the truth. Why are you really leaving?"

I shook my head in disbelief and finally choked out the words, "Why do you think?" needing nothing more to convey my reasoning, knowing he would get it from that.

Realization flashed in his eyes and he finally managed to let out a small, "Oh."

"To say the least," I said, with a slight grimace.

He breathed a small, dry chuckle. "You really think that calls for something this drastic? I think you've made your point. I've hurt you. And, I'm sorry about that, I am, but it's not so simple as all that. I can't just take back everything I did to you and you have no right punishing Lissa for it."

"Punishing Lissa—I am not doing this to punish Lissa," I snapped. "I am not doing this to punish you. I am doing this because the only way I can go on living my life is if you are not in it. If you are completely gone. If _I_ am completely gone. You want me to be okay—you refused to let me die back there, so guess what? You want me to deal? Then fuck off and let me deal in the only way I can. This is me dealing."

"This is not you dealing. This is you giving up," Dimitri accused.

"Why shouldn't I? You did!" I pointed out, the anger boiling up inside me, seconds from exploding.

"I gave up on having a relationship with you," he corrected. "Not on you as a person. I would never give up on you as a person."

"My mistake," I cried out, not bothering to hide my sarcasm. "You'll have to forgive me—you failed to make that differentiation when you yelled at me in that church."

"Well, what choice did I have?" he demanded. "Rose, you have no idea how hard it is to even look at you after what I did. I had no right to even be around you. Not after the way I hurt you."

"Yeah, you're absolutely right. Me seeking you out is totally _your_ violation of that right," I said, with a heavy emphasis on the words to really make him see how stupid they were.

"Will you take this seriously?" he asked, appalled.

"Won't you?" I threw back in his face. "Okay, Dimitri, try to hear me. As hard as it might be for you to believe, I understand. I would never hold anything you did to me against you. For the fifty zillionth time, It. Was. Not. You. You have got to stop beating yourself up for something that _you_ didn't do."

"But I did!" he argued. "Whether or not it was really me, I still hurt you. I still put you through hell."

"_I_ put me through hell, Dimitri," I corrected. "You had nothing to do with it. It was not your decision to make. I knew exactly what I signed up for when I set out to look for you. I knew that pain and hurt were pretty much inevitably attached. I accepted it. I'm okay with that."

"Well, I'm not."

"Tough," I said, leaving no room for argument or contradiction. "After everything, I think I was entitled to make that call on my own. Dimitri, I don't blame you for anything you did to me as a Strigoi."

"Just because you don't doesn't mean that you shouldn't," he said deadpan.

"Good God, that was, like, a triple negative," I observed, making him narrow his eyes at me. Shaking my head rapidly to snap back to reality, I turned back on him. "Dimitri, tell me something. If roles were reversed—if I was the one who was turned Strigoi—would you seriously sit there and put the blame on me and make me out to be the bad guy? When you knew that I had no control over the kills? Would you honestly sit there and let me beat myself up over something I had no control over?"

He breathed a strained chuckle. "Yeah, you know what, Rose, it's easy to take that moral high ground now. It's easy to sit there saying: 'It's not your fault' and 'It wasn't you' when it's not _you_ who has to live with it every day. It might not have been the real me, but it's the real me that is stuck with facing the consequences and coming to terms with what I did. It is the real me who has to see those faces and hear those cries of everyone I killed. Every minute of every day, it plagues my mind. That pain, that agony, it haunts me. You can't understand what that's like, having to live like that. Having to know that you're alive while someone else is dead—brutally murdered—by your hands. It hurts…" he trailed off and let out a sharp gasp, obviously not having meant to reveal so much of himself.

"Oh, well, it's supposed to hurt," I said, not letting him give in to his self-pity. He'd been doing that, sitting around moping, ever since he came back and, quite frankly, I was tired of it. "All that pain, all that suffering you've caused, is coming back on you. Feel it. Deal with it. Then, maybe you've got a shot at being free."

He shook his head, hanging his head in despair. "There is no freedom for me, Rose. No making it better. Nothing." There was a brief pause before he spoke his next words. "You heard him. Lucas," he added for clarification. "You heard him." His eyes flicked to mine, demanding some sort of response out of me. Demanding my hatred and blame and condemnation.

"I heard him," I confirmed. I said no more, not feeding into his utter desire to make me hate him.

"A baby, Rose," he reminded me, voice hard and grating. "An infant of no more than three months—I ripped that baby apart. I tore that poor, helpless child limb from limb…and I liked it. Then I went after his mother. The things I did to her…" he broke off to shake his head. "You can't possibly imagine what I did to her."

"I heard him, Dimitri," I repeated. "I know what you did. You raped her. Then, you tore _her _apart limb from limb. You ripped her to pieces, you feasted upon her, you reveled in the badass, tough guy feeling it gave you, and let me guess, you liked it. Every second of it.

"And when you weren't doing it, you were thinking about doing it. And when you were thinking about doing it, you were having withdrawals. Spazzing out and twitching uncontrollably in a ball on the floor, remembering the sweet, sweet taste of her bones and her flesh and her blood and her fear. How 'm I doing so far?" I added, when he just stared at me in utter shock and misery, not daring to believe my careless approach to the matter.

"Rose, what is the matter with you?" he finally asked, that shock and misery reflecting in his voice. "How can you be so nonchalant and uncaring about those people's lives?"

"I'm not," I argued. "I do care about those people's lives. But, they're dead now…and there's no coming back for them. But there is for you. And I will not sit here and just let you waste that second chance just because you refuse to get past the guilt.

"Yes, what you did was bad—even I acknowledge that. It was a horrible, horrible thing…the thing is, that's just it. That's all it is now. A horrible thing. It is no longer your problem because it was not you that did those things. It was something else entirely. It was that monster. That monster is dead now. It's gone forever. So, now there is no point to holding on to the past when you have your whole future lying ahead of you."

"No, I don't," he retorted. "I don't have any future lying ahead of me—I have nothing. I don't deserve anything after what I did."

"It wasn't you—"

"But it was!" he snapped, his voice on the verge of shouting. "And, that's what you don't get. It was me. And, nothing you say is going to change that fact. Not ever."

Giving up on the pep talk, I decided to play in to his game. "All right then. If it was you, then let's do this. Honestly, as of so far, I don't care what you did. You ate babies, good for you. You ripped out children's intestines and strangled them to death with them, great. You tore out some single mother's kidneys, her liver, her lungs and went to town on them, fantastic. Who hasn't? You found my long lost twin out there, ripped out her heart, and forced her to eat it while you watched in some voyeuristic sense of vamp pleasure, oh, my God, you are just so much cooler than I ever gave you credit for."

"_What_ is your point?" he spoke the words through clenched teeth.

"Well, I believe my point is I want you to prove me wrong. I want you to make me hate you so…let's sit down and go through this point-by-point. Starting from the second you opened your eyes with a sudden blood fetish to the second Lissa's stake pierced your heart and re-ensouled you, I want you to tell me exactly every little thing you did. Don't spare the details, please. I've got plenty of time here. I want to know everything down to the slight variation in the taste from a royal Moroi's blood to that of a newborn baby. Come on, we're doing this. Let's go."

He tensed up, not acknowledging the sarcasm in my words, but rather just basking in his misery. "Believe me, you really do not want me to do that."

"Oh, no, I think I really do." I argued. "Because, see, I want to understand just what is so fucking horrible, that I have proven to be quite beyond useless."

He let out an almost weary sigh. "It's not you; it's—"

"You say the words and so help me _God_, I will cut it off in your sleep—I am not even kidding," I warned, seeing just where he was going with this.

His sigh this time was frustrated. "Rose, do not make me do this. You do not want to know what I have done—you don't even know the nth of what I've done."

"Right, which is kind of the whole point behind the whole reminiscing plan I've got going on. So that I can know and I can understand and I can honestly say, to your face, after knowing everything there is to know, that I don't care. That it doesn't matter to me."

"Rose, that won't make a difference. This isn't about whether or not you care—I know you don't care. I know that I could sit here and list off the worst possible acts in the world from murder to rape to pedophilia to abuse and you would find some way to make it not be my fault. You would find some way to justify my actions and make it okay."

"That's because it _isn't_ your fault," I repeated, for the zillionth time. "You could sit here and list off the worst possible acts in the world and nothing you say will make it your fault. And, that is what you refuse to realize. You refuse to just acknowledge the fact that it wasn't you."

"Whether or not it was me is kind of irrelevant at this point, wouldn't you say? Those people are gone, Rose. Dead. Murdered. Tortured. Raped. Maimed. Destroyed…by my hand, by these hands."

He held up his hands in a dramatic gesture to really drive home his point. "Whether or not I was the one behind the wheel does not change the fact that it was these hands that destroyed those people. And it was some deep, dark part of this mind that really enjoyed that destruction. That truly reveled in it. The feeling those kills stirred in me…that all-powerful, invincible feeling that nothing could ever hurt me. Nothing could ever defeat me or measure up to me…that feeling? It was all in here."

He tapped his temple with two fingers. "It was some part of me that had nothing to with the Strigoi in me. It was the Dimitri Belikov in me."

"I don't believe that," I said with utmost certainty.

"I wouldn't expect you to," he said, speaking with almost a sense of superiority like he was so much wiser and superior to me because he had all this guilt stirring in him. And apparently that made him better than me on the scale of wisdom.

"No," I said. "I mean, I really don't believe that. I know what you're talking about, Dimitri, I have had that very same feeling after performing a kill. That all-powerful, invincible feeling…that's not a Strigoi thing. That's not even a Dimitri thing. That's just a killing thing, in general. When you triumph over your enemy, when you put them down and come out on top, that very feeling surges through you. It's the ultimate high. It's knowing that nothing on earth can ever reach you. Nothing can touch you. It's the prevalent feeling of knowing that you made it through one more day, one more battle…and you're still standing."

"Right," he said, his voice lacking emotion. "So that's your justification? That's your reasoning for why it's okay I slaughtered all those people?"

"No, of course not," I shot back. "You're right. There is no justification for that. There is no reason that could ever make that okay. I am just saying that it wasn't you who did it. We killed the monster that did those things—the thing responsible for it all is gone. Destroyed forever. It's never coming back. You were nothing more than an innocent bystander in the whole matter. You were the victim here."

"All Strigoi that were forcibly turned were victims once upon a time," he pointed out. "That still doesn't make what they're doing okay."

"Right…but they didn't come back. You did. And with spirit now advancing and the extent of its uses slowly but surely being revealed, we might find a way someday to save them all at some point. But this is today. And, today, I don't care about saving anyone else. Only you."

"Don't you understand?" he cried out, in his desperation. "I am beyond salvation. Beyond all redemption. That point was long passed months ago and I can't ever go back. It's done."

"You," I began, "are in no way beyond any salvation or redemption. Do you hear me? If there is a God, the man would have to be a freakin' idiot to let you go. I don't know much about Him, since learning about Him actually meant paying attention to Sunday sermons which bored the hell outta me, but I remember hearing a thing or two about him being compassionate, yes? And, loving. Understanding. And, if He is the God I hope He is…He will jump at the chance to save you."

"Maybe your god would," he relented. "But I'm pretty sure that even God—_the_ God—has limits as to just what He will put up with."

I sighed. "Dimitri, you have no idea just how short you sell yourself, do you? You…are a million times the man that you give yourself credit for. You know what, yeah, you made mistakes. You fell in battle, you went through a dark period, you came back…but if anything, that dark period has only made you all the stronger. I don't have faith in much anymore, Dimitri, but one thing that I have always had an unwavering faith in…is you."

He exhaled shakily, his voice coming out more strained than I'm pretty sure he intended it to when he spoke his next words. "Rose, it's not just killing those people. It's so much more than that. It's you. You were there, you know. You know what I did to you. How could I—? It doesn't matter what horrible, sadistic creature I had become, there is absolutely no excuse whatsoever for what I did to you."

I rolled my eyes. "You know, Dimitri, honestly, if you're going to sit here bitching yourself out for that, might as well go ahead and bitch myself out too. It's like you said: it wasn't really you. So, you had no sense of morality, no sense of right and wrong, nothing. Your essence, your soul, your…whatever it is that makes you Dimitri Belikov, was gone. It was utterly and completely destroyed. You didn't know any better.

"But I did," I added, bold and confident. "It really was me. I had everything—I had that morality, that sense of right and wrong. My essence was still fully intact. I knew exactly what I was doing and I just didn't give a shit. I abandoned my principles, everything I had ever known to be right or wrong in life, I forsook it all. I could've fought harder, but I didn't. I chose of my own free will to let you kiss me, to hold me…to bite me."

He flinched. "I let you hold me in captivity and bring me to my weakest, most vulnerable state just because it was you. I just wanted to be with you, regardless of what monstrous creature you had become. I just wanted you. So, yeah. Yeah, it was just as much my fault as it was yours—even more so, actually."

He stared at me for a long moment, choosing his words carefully, clearly not wanting to contradict himself, but not wanting to admit I was right either. "Don't do that," he said, when he finally did speak again. "Don't you stand there making excuses for me. Nothing you say is ever going to fix anything."

"I'm not saying it will." I said. "I'm just saying that as bad as it was…nothing you did to me as a Strigoi _ever _could have hurt me _near_ as much as you did when you told me you could never love me anymore. What you did to me as a Strigoi…that wasn't you. That pain meant nothing to me. But, telling me you couldn't love me? That _was_ you. That was the _real _you. That, Dimitri…_that_ is what really destroyed me in the end."

Keeping his eyes locked on mine, I saw that stoicism falter, the tiniest hint of pain flickering in his expression. I have no idea how long we stood there, just staring at each other, challenging the other one to break the silence first…but neither of us did.

We just stared.

And stared. And stared.

Finally, knowing he had to say something, Dimitri spoke. "I'm sorry. You have to believe me, Rose, I never wanted it to come to this. I didn't know…" He trailed off and very slowly, hesitantly, reached his hand out to touch me.

Seeing his intent, I jerked away before he could actually make contact. "No," I said, the word bordering dangerously on a whimper. "Don't touch me."

His arm immediately fell to his side. "Rose—" he began, his voice having a tremulous note to it.

"No!" I cried out, more assertively this time. "Don't. I don't want to hear it anymore. I know, you were doing the right thing. The right thing. The right fucking thing. And it _kills_ you to do it, right? Well, guess what? I don't care anymore. I'm sorry, I just can't."

"Rose, you don't understand—"

"No, Dimitri, it is _you_ who doesn't understand!" I accused. "You so don't get it. You don't get anything! I gave _everything_ for you. And this is what you give to me? I gave up everything, everything I ever had to save you…and I did it, all of it, for you. And, I lost everything for nothing. And you? You aren't even grateful. I might as well just not exist, as far as you're concerned, and I'm fucking sick of it. If you cannot treat me with the respect and gratitude I deserve, then you better get out of here. Just get the fuck out of here!"

I was screaming my words by the end and, sensing the precedent to my lapsing into lashing out mode, Dimitri reached out and gripped me tightly by my upper arms. He jerked me towards him so I collided hard with his chest and was now pressed right up against him.

Neither of us spoke for a long moment—neither of us having anything to say. Suddenly, that smoldering, sexual tension burned between us again. It almost seemed as if there were invisible forces at work, drawing us together, pulling us even closer together as that heat and anxiety built up.

I couldn't help but focus on every place our bodies touched, how my body conformed perfectly to his, almost as if molded from one another. Our legs and torsos were touching, my breasts pressing against his chest with my forced breaths. Yelling like that had taken its toll and I found breathing to be quite difficult…made all the harder while this much of me was already touching Dimitri.

His fingers bit in even tighter to my upper arms, though it wasn't out of restraint. It was out desire and passion. Oh, God, I definitely recognized that grip—his fingers pressing harder into my skin, then letting go, then pressing harder, then letting go…the sign of just how turned-on he was…

That very desire and passion burned strongly in his eyes as he regarded me in a way that made that familiar heat build between my legs, a very welcome feeling that I had not felt this strongly since that one night that we did have sex.

It took me this long to realize that my hands were clutching desperately at his hips, probably since I would've ricocheted off his chest and fell to the floor had I not grabbed a hold of _something_ to keep me upright. True, I had his hands holding me up, but it was just instinct. My hands had shot out in search for something—anything—to save me from the potentially nasty fall.

His breathing was just as forced and ragged as mine, I realized, after having his chest rise and fall so rapidly, so desperately against mine. After a long, grueling moment of contemplation—realizing neither of us really did have anything to say—I acted instead. I finally did the thing I had been longing to do since the day of his return.

My hands moved up to fist around the fabric of his duster, jerking the coat of his shoulders and letting it fall to the floor. A strange look crossed his face and he opened his mouth, so—fearing he would protest my next action—I did it before he could get that far. I tore open his button-down shirt, hard enough that I'm pretty sure I heard a couple buttons rip off, and I ripped it off him before discarding it on the floor with his jacket. With a breathless chuckle, I took the briefest of moments to take in the glorious sight of his bare chest, having been deprived of it for so long. My eyes drank in the familiar smooth tanned skin and the distinguished, perfect lines of the oh, so toned muscles. Dear God, the perfection…

I pressed my palms hard against his stomach—feeling the distinct muscles of his abdomen ripple against my hands—before slamming him hard against the wall. He actually grimaced and inhaled sharply at the brief pain he felt from the impact, but if anything, that seemed to only spur him on just as much as it had me. My hands then clutched tightly at his shoulders, my fingers biting in all the harder to drag him down to at least meet me halfway as I stood up on my tiptoes and crushed my lips hard against his. My lips pressed eagerly into his, hard and demanding, as they sought out a response. Oh, and respond they did. His lips answered mine, his hot and passionate and fierce against mine.

Wasting no time, his tongue darted out, seeking entrance, and my lips immediately parted in response to his. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, my God…God, I had forgotten just how amazing it had felt to kiss him—to kiss dhampir Dimitri like this. It had been months—months—since I had actually been able to kiss him like this and God, the feelings that one kiss triggered inside me were beyond indescribable. I suddenly couldn't remember what we had been fighting about.

His arms immediately encircled me, his embrace tightening passionately as he held me against him, that kiss intensifying more and more.

God, the world—the whole universe—lie in that one kiss. It was so powerful, filled with so much love, so much unspoken emotion between us. In that kiss, it was so easy to believe that everything would be okay. If we could just stay here together, then we could, without a doubt, conquer the world. We could indeed say that forever is more than just a word.

And if we could fight through the conquest, we would do just that_. Forever, forever, forever_...some voice was practically singing for joy in my head.

_Time to conquer the world_, I thought, as my lips continued to move fast and furious in perfect synchronization with Dimitri's. My hands slid down his chest, across his stomach…down to undo his pants.

Oh, yeah. Time to conquer the world, most definitely. 

**A/N: And, there you have it. Hope you liked it and it was worth the wait. The next chapter will be up VERY soon—a lot sooner than last time, I assure you—and, as you can guess, there WILL be LOTS of Dimose sex. It will be hardcore and EXTREMELY graphic, so please do not read it if that bothers you. I don't want to offend anyone, but you know what, I have lots of pent-up Dimose sexual tension and I need a release…figuratively speaking, of course. LOL. BE WARNED. Love ya guys and I'll be back soon with more. **


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: WARNING:: THIS CH. IS RATED MA (mature adult). THIS IS THE DIMOSE SEX SCENE AND AS I SAID BEFORE, THIS SCENE WILL BE VERY, VERY GRAPHIC—BORDERING QUITE DANGEROUSLY ON PORN, EVEN. DO. NOT. READ. IT. IF. THAT. BOTHERS. YOU! ****I'm sorry, but I am a HUGE Dimose shipper—obviously—and being that it's a YA series, we don't get a lot of detail in our sex scenes. I have no such restraint, however, and I want to express myself and my lack of Dimose sexual frustrations freely. So, BE AWARE that this is a VERY HARD-CORE ch. **

**Also…embarrassing as this to admit, I have never even kissed a guy—much less had sex—so if there are any inconsistencies, I apologize. This is just MY opinion and what I would do to Dimitri Belikov, were I given the chance. Haha ****Enjoy, guys. (And keep a bucket of cold water nearby.)**

"Roza." The name was on Dimitri's lips—a low, guttural sound in the back of his throat—long before he could find it within himself to stop this from happening. I could sense the reluctance in him—the warring of emotions within him, morality and desire fighting against one another.

It was at that point that I realized I needed to do something drastic to tip the scales in my direction, something to make him give in and forget whatever worries and concerns were plaguing him right now.

So I went for it. Exercising no caution or hesitation whatsoever, my hands fumbled to rip his pants open. The button popped open and, with trembling hands, I tugged down the zipper.

His eyes jerked open in surprise and he broke the kiss, clearly not expecting me to be so bold. He gave me what was meant to be a questioning look, but only had a second before I took his face fiercely in my hands and brought my lips to his again.

It took no more than that to earn a response from him, his lips answering mine as diligently as they had before. Those worries soon fell away—the world soon fell away—as our kissing steadily increased. The kissing soon became so intense that I had to grip his arms tightly in order to support my own body weight. I grew weak in the knees and, fearing that I'd be collapsing in his arms any minute now, I did the only I could do. Breaking the kiss, I raced my hands down his chest and looped my fingers through his belt loops…while I sank to my knees before him.

"Rose," Dimitri gasped out, his chest heaving with how labored his breathing was. "What are you—?"

"Shut up!" I immediately ordered.

And, with that command, I fought to remove his pants. Slowly but surely, I pulled them down his legs, past his knees…finally letting them fall free into a heap by his ankles. Flicking my eyes up to meet his, I allowed a small smirk to escape as I lifted one of his legs and assisted him in the complete removal of his pants.

Once I had the pants and boxers removed, I looked up at him with a knowing glint in my eyes to relay the message of what I was about to do here just in case he missed the memo in his state of delirium.

"Rose," he said, a tremulous note to his voice. "Rose, please don't. Rose, please I am begging you to not—oh, God…" There was a note of surrender underlined with desire in his voice that I couldn't help but notice and appreciate. "…oh, God…slageet minya, Roza…" was the last thing he said, his voice cracking on the words as he watched what I did with utter fascination…

And, that was all it took for me to do the deed.

Paying him no mind whatsoever, I grabbed a hold of his hips to pin him in place against the wall as I leaned forward and went to take him into my mouth. Deciding to tease him a bit first, I stopped halfway through it, my mouth hovering directly above his already throbbing erection. His hand soon tangled in my hair and began directing my head towards it, trying to force me to take him in…but I wouldn't do it. Not yet.

Instead, my tongue darted out and rolled across the head—just barely brushing it, applying hardly any pressure at all at first. I wanted to just tease him and get him all worked up without actually giving him the satisfaction. I could soon taste the first salty drops that had managed to escape, but he did well to keep his arousal under control. Go figure. Like I could really expect anything else from the poster boy of control.

Hmm. Maybe I _should_.

My hot, desperate gasps of air flowed onto his cock, my parted trembling lips lightly pressing against his flesh. My lips were so close to his skin that I was pretty sure he could actually feel it as my lips tugged up into a smirk against his skin. I shifted myself so that the inside of my lower lip now caressed the underside of his cock. My tongue began dragging in one swift motion along the length of his shaft—repeating the motion again and again—until there was not one inch of his skin that was not glistening with the combination of my saliva and his pre-come.

His cock was now throbbing violently with the force of the incoming orgasm. I could feel it burning within him; surging its way through him, on the verge of breaking its way through the surface. God, it was only a matter of seconds—if that—before it happened.

And that was all it took. Knowing I had very little, if any, time left, I went for it. There's no need putting off the inevitable—at least this was a _good_ inevitable that could be put off no longer. Wrapping my lips gently around the tip, I wound my tongue around the shaft and tugged it into my mouth—pulling him in as far as he would go until he was practically pressed against the back of my throat. I began sucking urgently on him, grazing him gently with my teeth, while my tongue and lips working in the most perfect of synchronization with one another to achieve the best effect possible on him.

The orgasm exploded the second he entered my mouth, ripping its way through his body. His cock was now throbbing so hard that I could feel the vibrations of it in my mouth. The hot liquid was soon gushing out onto my tongue. I gathered whatever I could of it with my tongue, as most of it raced to the back of my throat and I swallowed hard to keep from choking on it.

As the orgasm tore through him, he actually began shaking—shaking so hard in fact, that I could feel his body quaking against mine. His body would spasm hard against mine, my hands on his hips seeming to be the only things keeping him upright. His knees eventually buckled—weakened from the toll that had taken on him—and he fell back against the wall, unable to support his own weight any longer.

"Roza," he cried out, as he alternated between throwing his head back against the wall and lurching forward to bury his face in my hair, using the scent of my hair as a distraction to try to recover from the intensity of the orgasm.

He let out another soft cry before throwing himself back against the wall again, his back arching and his body involuntarily shifting to force me to keep drinking him down. Not that I really needed any outside reinforcements, but still...

I could feel his eyes on me, the wonder and fascination radiating off of him as he watched me. My cheeks would blow in and out and in and out with how hard I was sucking him. Involuntary whimpers and sighs and moans would escape my lips and something told me he enjoyed that almost as much as he enjoyed the actual BJ, itself.

Even if countless girls had gone down on him before, I was pretty sure that it had never before been quite like this. Not once. No way could it ever have been this amazing. Just something in the way he held me and begged me for more and cried out my name...it was just so different…so full of meaning. Not that life really held much meaning when you had some hot chick sucking on your dick all hard-fucking-core, I'm sure, but nonetheless. It did now…for whatever reason.

"Roza…" he called out again, but I didn't stop. Not for anything. I drank him down until there was nothing left inside him, sucking him raw practically. In fact, when I finally did release him and pull away, he grimaced slightly with the brief pain he felt and I felt pretty damn sure that he would probably have himself a pretty hard-core bruise there later. Oops. My bad.

Rising to my feet, I kept my hands firm on his hips as I leaned in and pressed a hard kiss to his lips. Without hesitation, he returned it, but he was a lot weaker than he had been before so it wasn't as eager and urgent as he had intended it to be.

"God, Roza…" he choked out, his words coming out muffled by my lips on his. "…what are you doing to me? You can't—you're gonna kill me—" he cut himself off abruptly, not even knowing what it was he wanted to say here.

I chuckled once softly in response before reaching down, not even giving him a chance to fully recover from the blow job I had just given him. Without any warning whatsoever, I gently wrapped my hand around his cock, which was rapidly becoming hard again. Damn. I had forgotten just how excellent of stamina that man had going for him.

Once I knew he could handle it without spontaneously combusting or something, I began softly stroking him, giving him one long, tantalizing stroke. Followed by another. And, another. And, another. I increased the pressure and speed of each stroke and moved on to squeeze and massage it.

He was too delirious with his ecstasy to actually call me on it or to try to stop me. No, he just stood there and allowed me to keep doing this, seemingly incapable to find the will to stop me. I kept my eyes on him as I did this, watching his every reaction—and feeling them against the palm of my hand, of course. It was pretty intense—really intense—how hard-core he got into it and how affected by it he was. I was sure to be careful—to do just enough to make for some interesting foreplay, but not enough to actually make him anything else happen quite yet, considering the ordeal I had just put him through.

No longer able to take it, I grabbed onto his shoulders and used that as leverage to hoist myself up so that I could hook my legs around his waist. He dutifully slid his arms underneath my legs to support most of my weight with his forearms and to be sure I was secure on his waist.

I never did stop giving him the hand job, my hand working steadily against him to help his erection move right along. To make matters worse, (or better, depending on how you looked at it) I eventually brought one arm up and wound it tightly around his neck, using that leverage to bring myself up and slam myself back down onto his waist, my hips bucking hard against his. I repeated this movement over and over again, and his hips started snapping up just as hard to meet mine until we found the perfect rhythm.

And, on and on it went. Our bodies collided hard against one another's—yet the harder one body would slam against the other, the harder the other one felt obligated to work to live up to the new standard.

It wasn't long before it was finally became too much for him to handle so he did the only thing he could think of: he found a distraction. Making sure I was secured on his waist and there was no way I could fall off him, he pressed me tighter against him and jerked us around so he could now slam _me_ against the wall.

And, before I knew what was happening, he had wrenched my legs even further apart and stepped in between them. Then, taking advantage of the fact that I was wearing nothing except for the t-shirt he had loaned me, he wasted no time in driving his hand in between my legs. He also managed to waste no time in continuing to press eager, hard, bruising kisses to my lips all the while. Dear God, was that boy talented.

Hooking one of his arms underneath leg, his forearm stretched across the length of my thigh, pinning my leg in place against his waist. Desperate to have every inch of my skin pressing against his, he tugged my leg up around his waist, winding my calf around his back. Digging his nails passionately into my hip, he began alternating between pulling it away and slamming it back down onto _his_ hip to increase the pleasure and intensity of it all.

I could feel his body rocking against mine between my legs, the slick skin of his waist and hips gliding effortlessly across that of my leg, my stomach…up to where my breasts where completely pressed against his chest. That movement between us caused the movement and pressure of them to increase against his chest, as the animalistic passion for one another consumed us entirely.

Suddenly, eager to taunt me as I had him, he draped my other leg over his shoulder while he continued to slam the one he was holding down onto his hip. Again and again and again. And, one of his hands shoved my shirt up so to just past my hips so that most of me was still obscured, though enough of me was exposed for him to tease and taunt me.

His fingers lightly stroked the warm, bare skin exposed to him between my legs. He stifled a gasp at the feel of it, pressing his fingertips even harder against the skin. He dipped two fingers down even lower, exploring everything I had to offer with nothing more than those two fingers.

He hesitantly brought his fingers down to slowly part my lips, spreading them as wide as he could and stroking me even harder and faster now, applying more pressure than before. He rubbed and he rubbed and he rubbed until I finally gave a small gasp and shifted myself against him so that I could feel the best parts of it in all the right places.

His fingers finally made their way over to my clit and he pinched it between his thumb and index finger. He gently squeezed it and stroked it and rubbed it, rubbing it between his two fingers for a long time, increasing the pressure more and more and more, loving the reactions this got out of me.

He stroked me again and again, switching back and forth between the actual clit and just stroking the skin in between my lips. Then, getting even more ambitious, he went for it. His fingers moved down to circle around my entrance a couple of times, waiting until I actually cried out, "God, do it!" before giving me the satisfaction.

He slid his fingers into my entrance with such ease, considering how wet I already was for him. He took great care not to hurt me. Considering everything I had been through, he wasn't sure how much I could handle right now. When he realized that I was perfectly fine, my gasps and moans and sighs did well to urge him on. His fingers slid into me all the way—and he was soon thrusting them in and out of me. In and out, in and out, in and out…

His fingers began twisting around inside me, moving every which way, his finger curling up and then opening again. He explored how I felt inside, stroking my inner walls, circling them perfectly and making sure to touch every last inch of me. He seemed so focused on the task at hand, it seemed as if he was quite intent on memorizing the exact feel of me. The very make up of me. Every single inch of me, he wanted to know by heart.

Before I could actually reach my climax, though, he pulled his fingers out of me, giving me a knowing smirk when I weakly tried—and failed—to protest it. It wasn't until then that he had finally—completely—broken the kiss.

"What—?" I mumbled. "But I don't—you can't—that's not—"

I shut up when I realized _why_ he had pulled out. Ensuring I was stabilized enough against the wall, he brought his arms around and gathered the now ruined fabric of the t-shirt in his hands and tugged it up and over my head before discarding it on the floor.

My breasts were immediately exposed to him since I wasn't able to put on a bra during our little spat. Not that I was complaining about that now—in fact, that played into this plan quite nicely. Now the _really_ good parts started.

Or so I thought until I saw the look on his face. As hungry and turned-on as his expression still was, there was something else there that I had assumed was long gone. Admiration. Affection. Love. Love for me. A very different type of love—one that he had convinced me he was incapable of. But now I saw—looking into his eyes, I could see as he stared at me, as he drank in the sight of me and everything I had to offer him…I could see that love. I could see that it was in no way dead. That it could never die. That it truly was still there in him and that I had somehow reawakened it within him.

Further confirmation to my stunning realization, he suddenly brought his lips down to mine—softly, gently…sweetly, even. As opposed to the area I'd automatically assumed he'd aim for. Hell, it was the area I know I would've aimed for if I was him.

Surprising me even more, he slid his arms around my back so that he could clutch me even closer to him. But again, the way he went about it was surprisingly gentle and tender. His fingertips were feather light as they brushed across the skin of my back, tracing slowly up my spine and then back down my shoulder blades and back up again.

I have no idea how long we were there, just holding each other and kissing like that, but it finally got to the point to where I couldn't take it anymore. I finally brought my hands up—releasing him and breaking the kiss very much against his will—but, he shut up when he saw my intentions.

And with no further warning, I lurched out, eager to taste some of the warm, soft skin of his chest. Oh, God…God, the taste of his skin on my lips was just so beyond amazing. Everything about him—his taste, his scent, how he felt—all of it was just so unbelievably overwhelming. I wasn't too sure if I could actually handle this—I felt like I was on the verge of exploding, myself.

Once I had tasted every inch of his skin—of his chest, his stomach, his throat—his hand moved between my legs again. His fingers slowly made their way back inside me, thrusting into me once more…and, that was when it happened…

He lunged forward and buried his lips in my breasts, not even bothering to take his time or be courteous about it. He just went for it. He captured my nipple between his lips and teeth and began sucking hard on it until it turned red from the pressure. But, God, did I so not care.

How could I really give a crap when he still had the one hand between my legs—teasing and taunting me—and his other hand was now cradling my free breast and massaging it? Not to mention, to top it all off, his tongue was circling around my nipple before flicking across it once, twice, and a third time. Then, his tongue began dragging along the skin of my breast, a scorching trail of fire following closely behind it on my flesh. My skin inevitably burned at his touch, knowing no other reaction.

"Roza," he breathed against the skin of my breasts, turning his head to rest the side of his head against it. My fingers now tangled in his sweat-dampened hair and I increased the pressure of his head against my breasts.

We stayed in that position for a long moment, just holding one another and recovering from the ordeals we had just put each other through. He held onto me, his arms embracing me like I was the world's most precious treasure. Finally, he shifted so his eyes could meet mine and something shifted in his features. Something intense. Something that I couldn't quite identify.

Realization flashed in his eyes and he shook his head slightly before offering me a small smile. "I do love you, Roza. You know that." It was a statement, not a question. He knew full and well that I knew he did. He couldn't deny it now—not anymore.

Before I could even open my mouth to answer him, he shifted me against the wall, adjusting me into the ideal position to make what he about to do all the easier. He slammed himself into me, earning a cry of approval from me.

Grimacing slightly, I pressed myself even closer to him. I let out a small gasp of pain at the feel of him squirming his way deeper inside of me, the feel of his erection throbbing against my inner walls as his body rocked hard against mine.

Noticing the brief pain he knew I felt, he raised his head so his eyes met mine and he chuckled once before saying breathlessly. "Sorry…" he trailed off unable to continue.

I shook my head and held up a trembling hand to stop him. "No…it's not…God, Dimitri, I don't…oh, God…"

He smirked slightly at my inability to talk before bringing his hand up to smooth down my hair, keeping his eyes on me. "What is it?"

My eyes locked on his with my next words, spoken with utmost certainty and desperation. "I need you inside of me," I gasped out, my voice so desperate it almost sounded as if I was in pain from merely speaking them. Which, to be honest, I kind of was. "Now. God, now, I need to feel you—all of you—inside me."

He chuckled again at my bluntness, not expecting it in this type of situation, before saying, with a shrug. "Suppose I could do that."

Keeping his hand on my face, he pressed a soft kiss to my lips as he thrust himself even harder into me. "Rose?" he whispered, as he began pressing soft kisses to my forehead, trailing them along my hairline until he finally reached my ear. "Rose, can you hear me?"

"Mm…" was all I could respond at the moment.

He heard my grunt of approval, telling him that he was there. It was mere seconds before I reached my own orgasm. Smiling against my ear, he whispered again, "Rose…I love you. Do you hear me; I love you." He continued moving himself against me, our hips once again bucking with one another's as we rode it out together. "Rose?"

I managed a small whimper, which he took as an answer. Smirking again, he whispered, "Roza, you feel that? Hmm, inside of you; you feel it?"

"Mm-hmm…" I gasped out, growing quite frustrated with the game of 20 questions…right up until the orgasm exploded within me, anyway. The orgasm ripped its way through my body, causing me to shake so violently, I was practically on the verge of convulsions from it. And…that was it.

"You feel it, don't you? Say it, say you feel it," he ordered.

"I do, I feel it…" He was lucky to get even that much out of me, all things considered.

"Mm…" he muttered in agreement. "Well, that right there, what you are feeling…that orgasm…that is what I feel every minute I am with you. Every…minute. Every time, it never fails. That, Roza, is what_ you_ do to me. That is why I love you."

Using the wall as leverage, I maneuvered myself so that my hair was spilling over my left shoulder, several of the strands brushing across his chest as I tightened my arms around his neck and brought my lips to his. Urged on by that, Dimitri drove himself deeper into me, his body rocking even harder against mine. By this point, there was no space whatsoever between our bodies. His thrusts grew longer and deeper, his body rocking so hard against mine that the press of his body weight against mine was pushing me even further up the wall.

Much too quickly, he broke the kiss—his lips still hovering above mine, but not quite touching them anymore. A smirk played on his lips as I gave a small grimace of frustration. "What—? I don't—what are you—?" I began, stammering my way incoherently through my words, struggling to make sense of anything at all. "Dimitri," I cried out, my head lolling weakly—deliriously—from side-to-side in my ecstasy.

"Shh…" he whispered, cupping my face in the palm of his hand both out of affection and to support it so that I wouldn't wind up collapsing or something with how weak I was. "Don't try to talk." His voice sounded quite hoarse so he cleared his throat before speaking again. "Just look at me. Can you do that for me? Roza?"

Forcing my eyes to remain open, I locked my eyes on his, suddenly unable to look away. As hard as it was to keep my eyes open, the sight of him—the sight of him gazing upon me with such love—was too much to look away from. I couldn't bring myself to do it, no matter how badly my eyelids wanted to close. My noble efforts earned a small smile from Dimitri.

"There she is," he muttered softly, with a slight chuckle.

How he managed to be somewhat sweet while being turned-on was beyond me. The man was actually having sex, about to reach his orgasm—his second orgasm mere seconds from exploding within him, if that—and he was still managing to be quite affectionate with me.

"Dimitri," I breathed, my mouth finding it quite difficult to actually form the word. "God…" I trailed off after that, having nothing more to say.

"Are you with me?" I nodded weakly. "I am so sorry. For everything," he continued. "You have no idea how—I'm sorry."

And he left it at that, instead bringing his head down and eagerly burying his lips in my breasts again. Ah, the sentiment I much preferred to words. His lips parted and he began taking my breast into his mouth, swallowing me whole. His teeth lightly grazed my hardened nipple, and his lips wrapped around the tip of it, his tongue dragging along the skin around it. He bit down gently on my nipple, until I urged him on. "Harder," I cried out. "Please, God, harder."

Apparently not quite sure which one I was referring to, he went ahead and did both—sinking his teeth even deeper into the soft, warm flesh of my breasts and slamming himself harder into me, making me cry out again in approval.

His erection was now so big and oh, so tight—burning so hot within me, searing its way through me. The feel of his skin gliding against mine, his hands, his lips caressing my flesh…all of it was like dousing a raging fire with gasoline.

And, him…oh, God…

As if on cue, we both reached our climaxes, both of us clinging to one another and shuddering violently as the shared orgasm tore through our bodies. Burying his face in my shoulder, he bit down hard on my skin to stifle his scream.

Grimacing slightly, I threw my head back against the wall and arched my back, pressing myself further against him, searching desperately for any way to be closer to him. My cries continued all the way throughout my orgasm, growing and growing until they practically bordered on screams.

"Dimitri…" I finally managed to call out. "Oh, God…you—I—"

"I know," he practically growled into the skin of my shoulder, with his struggle to breathe. He wanted to say something else, but there was nothing more to say. Not really, not now.

Our orgasms completely overtook us, and we held onto one another as if for dear life as we rode it out together, our bodies writhing and thrashing against each other. The force of our combined orgasms eventually grew to be so overwhelming, coursing its way through us until it finally exploded, actually gushing out of me and spilling out around him. The burning hot liquid began pouring down the inside of my legs, so intensely that it felt as if it had the power to scald me.

Dimitri's hand tightly gripped the inside of my leg, allowing that liquid to now pour over his hand. He gave my leg a gentle squeeze, earning a whimper from me. Eager to make me whimper again, he began running his hand up my leg—slowly, teasingly.

"Oh, God…" I cried out deliriously, tilting my head back against the wall, my back instinctively arching.

I began rocking hard against him—my hips snapping up to meet his, his returning the favor until we moved together in such perfect synchronization that it was as if we were very literally one body.

Smiling with that realization, Dimitri peeled me off the wall (literally, since my back was slick with sweat). Staggering us back, he kept my body pressed tightly against his own as our lips met, fire exploding between them again. Everywhere, the fire was everywhere. It was in us, it was around us, it was through us. We knew nothing outside that fire…

Both of us chuckling between kisses, he walked—or perhaps the word stumbled would be more accurate—us over to the bed, struggling not to collapse as he did so. God, it was wonder either one of us could stand at all after all we had just put each other through. I began trembling in his arms with my anticipation of what else was to come and that very anticipation seemed to urge him on even more.

Once we reached the bed, he hooked his arms through my legs to be sure he had a good hold on me before tossing me onto the bed, hard enough that I actually bounced back up. I cried out in surprise—and the slightest hint of disappointment—with the realization that he was no longer in me. What the fuck; when the hell did he—

"Dimitri," I gasped out, irritation managing to seep into my voice even through my aroused state. "What the hell do you think you're—"

I couldn't help but stiffen slightly, half-expecting his body to come slamming down on mine in that moment, but to my surprise…it didn't. _He _didn't. He didn't even move at first. He just stood there, frozen in place as he stared down at me, regarding me with the utmost adoration and love.

The look in his eyes was definitely one that even I had never seen before, one that I couldn't even define accurately with words. It was so much more than just love. It was love, it was remorse, it was…everything. Everything good in the world was made up of that look. There was no good in life, in the universe, without that one look.

"Dimitri?" I repeated. Confusion distorted my features as I looked up at him, trying to figure out what had just happened and why he was just standing there as opposed to getting on with the sex already. "What are you—?"

Without a word, he knelt down beside the bed in between my legs—which were hanging off the side of the bed—and painfully slowly, he eased my legs open. Grabbing hold of one of my calves, he tugged on my leg to straighten it out and ran his hand up the back of it. He did the same to my other leg, again wrapping his hand around my other calf—tugging on my leg until it was perfectly straightened out. His hands worked to wrench my legs open even further until he was able to slide up in between them enough to bring his lips up to mine.

His lips lightly pressed against mine and my head immediately tilted back in my attempt to deepen the kiss, but he wouldn't let me. He maneuvered his head slightly from side-to-side, pressing his lips harder against mine. His breath mingled with mine, but he refused to actually let the kiss go anywhere. It couldn't even be called a kiss—our lips were touching, breath mingling, but it was just that.

It wasn't until he finally heard a small cry of frustration escape my lips that I felt his lips smirk against my skin and he began trailing his parted, trembling lips in a perfect line down the middle of my chest. Slow and tantalizing, his lips brushed lightly against the miles and miles of smooth skin exposed to him. His breath was hot against my skin—coming out in short, desperate gasps—but he refused to do anything more than that quite yet.

Down and down his lips moved, a scorching trail of fire following oh, so closely behind—every inch of my skin feeling as if it would burst into flames any second now. God, it just had to—it was inevitable. Oh, God…

I shifted against him to feel his lips even more against my skin, slightly grimacing in my approval. I whimpered and pressed myself closer to him, calling out his name, right as his lips pressed against the bare skin of my stomach.

My flesh burned white hot against his lips—my body writhing and squirming beneath him, searching oh, so desperately for some way, _any_ way to be even the slightest bit closer to him.

His hands were tightly gripping my waist, pinning me in place against the bed. His tongue darted out, circling my belly button before traveling across the tight, sweat-coated skin of my stomach.

His teeth lightly grazed the skin of the very lowest part of my stomach before his mouth came down hard, biting me between my legs—not hard enough to actually hurt me, just hard enough to spur me on.

And, God, did that spur me on…I have gotta say…as exhilarating and extraordinary as his bites were as a Strigoi, this…this was a million times better. Even without the Strigoi endorphins, this aroused me in a way that all the Strigoi endorphins in the world never could.

"Oh, God, Dimitri…" I cried out, my voice cracking between my words. "Oh, please God, do it."

He pressed the palm of his right hand lightly against my leg, easing my leg open even more until it literally could not go any farther without being pulled out of its socket. He maneuvered himself to make what he was about to do all the easier, still keeping one hand wrapped tightly around my waist. He touched the tip of his tongue lightly to my inner thigh, dragging his tongue along my burning hot flesh—licking off the combination of our remains that were still staining my skin. God, it felt so hot by this point that I felt fairly certain that he would have burn marks on his own skin from mine by the time all was said and done here.

Tightening his arm around my leg until the full weight of it was resting on his forearm, he pressed himself harder against me, as his tongue continued on until there was no more leg left. There was not one inch of my leg that his tongue had not touched by this point and now we both trembled in anticipation as his tongue made its way over to between my legs. He gave my bare skin one swift lick before biting down again. Not as hard as last time, but definitely hard enough to make me cry out in pleasure so intense, it bordered on pain.

Pulling on my other leg and draping it over his shoulder, he pressed hard against the leg he was still holding, slamming it down against the bed to make it all the easier for him to gain access to me. My leg twitched, spasming uncontrollably against the palm of his hand and he actually struggled to keep it locked in place against the bed.

He finally released my waist before bringing his hand up and gently placing his fingertips against the skin of my breasts. Slowly dragging them across my flesh, he trailed them down my miles and miles of bare skin—barely brushing them against my skin as he did so.

Down by my legs, he froze up as his fingers continued running along my skin, almost as if that was the single most important thing in the world to him at the moment. He trailed them down, then back up, then down and back up again. And again and again, doing nothing more though his parted lips were hovering mere centimeters from the skin between my legs.

Finally, tracing the tip of his index finger slowly in a perfect line down the center of my stomach—feather light against my skin, brushing across my belly button—he came to a brief stop once he came to the very lowest part of my stomach. Without hesitation, his finger delicately traced down, reveling at how my skin inevitably flared up at his touch.

Tracing diagonally across my lips, his finger didn't stop until it reached my entrance, which he noticed was still plenty wet from our previous encounters. Smirking slightly, he slid his finger into me—for the briefest of moments—before almost simultaneously pulling it back out.

With an involuntary sound of protest, I allowed him to pull his finger out of me only to have him replace it with his tongue. Oh, dear God, his tongue…

…his tongue repeated the exact same process his fingers had earlier. His fingers kept my lips parted, holding them open as wide as they could possibly go.

His tongue dragged along the skin between my lips, which was so hot by this point that I'm pretty sure it felt like it was scalding the tip of his tongue. He even flinched slightly as if he had actually been burned, but if anything, that very burning spurred him on all the more. His teeth came down hard between my legs—once, twice, and a third time. Moving over only slightly, he bit down on my clit, taking it between his teeth and nibbling gently on it—actually going so far as to twist it experimentally between his teeth.

I let out a small cry of pain—no pleasure, just pain—but when he made to pull away, I slammed his head back onto me and practically yelled, "No! Don't you dare. You keep—you do it—"

Obliging, he went ahead and did what I told him to, alternating between biting, licking, kissing, and sucking on my clit and the rest of the skin between my legs. He eventually allowed his tongue to make its way over to my entrance. His tongue circled my entrance several times—to be sure I was still okay to do this. Yep, wet as I could be.

Urged on by that fact—not like he really needed that urging, there was nothing about me that _didn't_ urge him on, apparently—he slid his tongue inside of me. He began thrusting it into me—again and again and again, taking care not to hurt me, much like he had with his fingers. Not that that care was really necessary, considering how hard I started rocking against him once he was in me.

Winding my arms around his neck as tightly as I could in this position, I clutched him desperately to me, pressing closer to him and rocking so hard against him that it could easily have been mistaken for convulsions. God, the feel of his tongue darting around inside me, the feel of it stroking my inner walls—the feel of my inner walls contracting tighter and tighter around his tongue—came to be way too much for us to bear.

Wave after wave of ecstasy came crashing down upon us until my climax exploded within us, the burning hot liquid searing its way through me and flooding into him, gushing inevitably towards the back of his throat since it had nowhere else to go. Thrusting his tongue even deeper into me until he was practically drowning, he worked to gather every last drop of my orgasm, drinking me down like his life depended on it.

Oh, God…

The speed and intensity of his thrusts grew more and more—greater and greater. He refused to let up for anything—no matter how worn out we became, no matter how much pain he knew I was in right now. Nothing else mattered, outside of this moment. There was nothing else, nothing more—aside from us. There was Dimitri. There was me. And, there was his tongue…thrusting so hard into me, moving around inside me…

That was all there was, all there could be. What, like we really needed anything else? What for? We needed to make up for lost times—we had lost months, _months_ with each other and we couldn't let one second of our time together go to waste. We had to make the most of each one and treat it like the remarkable gift and miracle it truly was…

He waited until I was almost completely dried out before finally removing his tongue, keeping up with his thrusts and everything else up until now. When he finally did pull out, incoherent mumblings were all I could really protest with.

My head turned deliriously from side-to-side and I called out for him repeatedly. It was almost like I wasn't here anymore, like I had temporarily gone away for a moment. I wasn't making any sense at all. I struggled to make just one statement that made sense, just one that expressed what it was I needed to know. But, I couldn't. I cried out again as I looked to him for help.

"Hey," he whispered, with a small smile playing at his lips. He stretched his arm up to place his hand gently against my cheek. "It's all right, I'm here; I'm right here."

I looked to him, slightly puzzled, almost not expecting to see him there. "You're still here," I said, as if realizing it for the first time. Wow, that orgasm had definitely taken its toll on me.

"I'm still here," he confirmed. "I'm always here," he added unnecessarily. "Where else would I be?" he practically laughed the words in his amusement.

"A dream," I suggested, knowing that was an invalid answer. He asked where—not what. I just couldn't think of anything that could qualify as a valid answer right now.

He shrugged, with a slight grimace. "Not a dream," he clarified. "Believe me, I have had _lots_ of dreams of just this, of having sex with you…and nothing ever really compares to the real thing. Not with you."

Smiling, he rose to his feet and—still holding me in his arms—he pulled me the rest of the way onto the bed and laid me gently on my side before coming down beside me, lying on his side so he could face me. "You all right?" he asked, still amused by my reaction.

Nodding, I continued on, "Yeah…hey, why'd you stop?" I gave him a scowl, having recovered and finally realized what had happened.

He smiled again. "Maybe because if we didn't stop, you probably would've collapsed and been unconscious on the floor right about now." He pressed a light kiss to my forehead. "Go on and sleep. It's okay. I'll still be here when you wake up, I promise. And, we'll pick up right where we left off," he assured me.

I scoffed. "Hell with that; we go again," I insisted. "Screw that crap, no way in hell I'm sleeping."

"Rose, we really don't—" he began, but I abruptly cut him off.

I let out a grunt as I threw my weight against him, using the weight of my body to flip him over, before my body came crashing down hard on his. I maneuvered myself so that my long, dark, sweat drenched hair fell over my shoulder, spilling onto his chest and even getting in his face as I brought my lips down to his in a crushing kiss.

"Rose—" he tried again, but this time, it was smothered off by my lips on his. "You're tired," he mumbled against my lips, so it was almost impossible to understand. "You need sleep."

I gave a careless shrug. "Not as much as I need the sex. That takes priority over the sleep."

Now he was the one to let out a whimper. "Oh, God…I can get down with that."

"That you can," I agreed. "And, I can offer some assistance if you need yourself a helping hand there…"

He chuckled. "From you, I always need a helping hand."

"Hmm, just so happens I've got myself a hand to spare," I said, my hand reaching down to grip him tightly, making him cry out in surprise as I began giving him yet another hand job. "And, quite a few other body parts," I informed him as I positioned his already full-on hard cock at my entrance. The tiniest stir from either one of us and he would slide right into me.

My lips were now at his ear. "Just say the word and they're yours," I offered.

"Word," he choked out, his voice strained since he was holding his breath to keep from crying out again.

Smirking, I exhaled shakily—allowing my hot breath to flow into his ear—before whispering, "Word it is."

With that, I assisted him in sliding into me the rest of the way. I clenched his body tightly between my thighs and started to ride him yet again. I shifted my weight against his repeatedly to help him fit in me easier. Bringing my lips to his again, our lips met, practically fused together by this point. He cried out—the sound smothered off by the force of my lips on his—as his arms made their way around me, clutching me even tighter against him and assisting me in moving against him. Oh, God…

On and on, I continued riding him, as if my very life—my very existence—depended on this moment:

At one point, I tugged his nipple between my teeth and bit down on it—keeping my eyes on his face to watch the changes in his expression as I did so. Then, I wrapped my lips around the hardened tip of his nipple and began sucking urgently on it, my teeth scraping across the skin surrounding it and my tongue lapping over it again and again.

I did the same thing to the other side, taking my time in doing so. My hands now traveled up his arms, down the length of his waist, and over to his stomach to keep him pinned down on the bed. My fingertips delicately traced the distinct shape of his six-pack, barely brushing the skin at times, while intensely massaging and squeezing it at others.

I finished up with his chest before somehow managing to bring my lips down to his stomach—not easy to do in this position, but when the guy was that hot, you made any position work!

Doing so made him twist inside me at an awkward, uncomfortable angle, causing me to cry out at the brief pain I felt, but no way in hell would I ever let that stop me. With a quick jolt of my body against his, the problem was immediately fixed and I let out a moan at the feel of him shifting inside me. He continued on, thrusting into me harder and harder as if nothing had happened.

With that, I grabbed hold of his waist, my hands tightly gripping his sides as I held onto him, and I picked up right where I left off. My teeth came down hard on his six-pack, biting down on him so hard that I felt fairly certain I should've drawn blood, but I didn't. Damn, he must've had himself some pretty tough skin.

I went on to give his six-pack the exact treatment I had given his chest, smothering every inch of his flesh with hot, hungry kisses—my lips, teeth, and tongue working harmoniously, rhythmically with one another to do absolutely anything my mouth deemed possible to the skin of his chest and stomach.

Up and up I went. Tasting everything he absolutely had to offer me, reveling in the taste of his skin and our combined sweat on my lips. Up to his throat again. Over to bury my face in his shoulder, reveling in the way the muscles in his shoulder would ripple against my lips at the slightest stir or movement from him. Straightening up, I just sat there on top of him, still straddling his waist as I stared down at him for a long moment.

Finally dragging my body back to his, he stretched me out across the length of his body before bringing his lips to mine. Snaking one arm tightly around my waist until his forearm stretched diagonally across my back, his other hand started at my shoulder and trailed up to twine in my hair.

Keeping his lips fused to mine and my body completely pressed against his, he finally rolled us over so now he was on top. With one maneuver, he flipped us over, managing to somehow stay inside me as he did that—more importantly, keeping up with and actually increasing his thrusts as he did so.

Letting out another sigh at that, knowing that he had done been able to do that without having to take a break, I arched my body even closer to his. My arms wound their way around him, my palms tracing the flawless skin of his back, once again, enjoying the way his muscles would flex and contract against my fingertips or the palms of my hands.

Tightly gripping his back, I continued moving my body hard against his—increasing the pressure and speed of that movement, until I felt myself become tight around him. Again, I could feel it coming, I was on the verge of it. Any second now, I was going to—

…and with that, it happened. I came and I came—just when I thought I was incapable of coming anymore…I came. His thrusts met mine perfectly, his hips bucking hard against mine again and again until his climax was reached, shortly thereafter.

His lips continued moving against mine, now moving at the exact same rhythm that his body moved against mine. Hot, hard, fast, and demanding—he moved against me, harder and harder until I could practically feel the bruises beginning to form on my skin.

Hot, hard, fast, and demanding—he released himself into me.I let out a scream—not a cry, but a full-on: "Oh, my God, someone is killing her in there" _scream_—at the feel of my orgasm meeting his—the feel of him worming his way further inside me, slithering into me like a parasite. Albeit, a very welcome, very orgasmic parasite that I never wanted to leave. One that I refused to ever let go of.

Tilting my head back to reach my lips to his easier, I continued on, allowing the kiss to deepen, allowing him to drive himself the rest of the way into me. As he kissed me, his hand made its way over one of my breasts. He cradled it in his hand—cupping it in his palm, as he began fondling me—massaging circles into my breast, increasing the speed and pressure as he continued doing so.

His hand continued working against my breast—doing things to me I never deemed possible—rubbing me so raw that my skin was actually red from how hard he had massaged me. It wasn't until he felt me flinch beneath him and heard my sharp intake of breath that he finally stopped and withdrew his hand, realizing now how tender I was.

To compensate for that lacking, he threw himself deeper into the kiss, tracing his tongue along my lower lip and capturing it between his lips and sucking hard on it. I whimpered into his mouth with that, urging him on. So like that, his tongue went on to enter my mouth, exploring it as if it had the most precious of treasures to offer him.

"Oh, God…" I called out, for what had to be, like, the zillionth time tonight, gasping the words into his mouth. No matter what I said or did, nothing would ever be good enough to do him justice. "Dimitri," I practically choked on his name as it left my lips, my voice cracking halfway through it.

He broke the kiss for the briefest of moments to stare at me, giving me a questioning yet affectionate look. "Roza," he acknowledged, since I never did continue on.

Smiling deliriously, my eyes met his before I spoke again. "I love you," I muttered, almost as if realizing it for the first time.

Instead of responding with words, he returned the smile before mumbling a small, incoherent, "Mm…" and bringing his lips down, pressing his lips to the slightly sweaty skin of my throat . "I know you do," he agreed, still not removing his lips from my skin. "And, I love you…" he practically growled the words, as his lips raced down my throat to my heaving, sweaty chest.

I had no doubt that he couldn't help but appreciate the fact that my breasts rose and fell rapidly with my labored breathing, accentuating them in a way that made them all the more obvious. Not that my breasts could ever be_ not_ appealing to him, but nonetheless…

Something about the way he was just lying there, gazing down at me as I waited to see what he was going to do—God, it was such a turn-on, but it was more than that. Whatever _it _was, it was powerful. I couldn't help but feel that same sense of oneness and unity with him (that very connection that had been established long before that first night we had sex). Such a deep and strong connection (aside from the very physical connection we had going on at the moment, of course)—like we were the two key pieces to the most perfect puzzle ever made.

I could not believe just how strong that particular connection was. Now that I felt it, I couldn't remember ever not having it. Not with him. I had tried uselessly to get it through other guys—to take what I could get—but I never could. And, it occurred to me now that this was why. Because none of them were him. They weren't _the_ him.

With that realization, I realized just how much he meant to me—just how much I loved him and how much I needed him in my life—and that very realization ignited the spark within me once again, making me need to do this.

I wrapped my arms tighter around him as he wound his arm around my waist to clutch my body against his. He lifted me off the bed practically to ensure that I was as pressed against him as I could be. He lurched forward and captured my nipple between his lips, immediately sucking hard and fast. Smiling against my breast, he brought his other hand up and caressed my other breast with the back of his knuckles. That hand continued caressing and touching my breast, but he made sure to keep the touch feather-light since he knew how tender I was.

Meanwhile, his mouth continued working hard against my other breast, easing my breast into his mouth until he had swallowed me whole and he was now kissing, biting, licking, sucking—doing anything and everything his mouth knew to do when presented with a breast.

Right as he bit down on my breast, I cried out—my voice breaking again—and I held onto him right as our second orgasm in a row was reached and my cries grew and grew until my voice had become hoarse and my throat was actually sore from my attempts to keep my screams to a minimum.

Releasing himself into me—and me into him—we clung to one another so desperately as we rode out the aftershocks of it together, not once stopping for anything.

Not for anything, not for the world…

And, on and on this world continued.

It didn't actually end until I finally collapsed weakly against his chest, sighing contentedly as I nestled into him. My eyelids drooped shut before my head had even collided with his chest. Pressing a soft kiss to my hair, he kept his arms wrapped tightly around me as his lips grazed down my skin and he began nuzzling my neck. Burying his lips in the smooth skin of my throat, his lips twisted into a weak smile and a small sigh escaped him.

It wasn't long before I felt him fall asleep too—both of us completely worn out from the toll that experience had taken on us.

So—holding each other in our arms, clinging to one another as if for dear life—we slept, taking a kind of solace in the other person that neither of us had ever dreamed existed. A solace and comfort that only the other person had to offer.

**A/N: In case you didn't get it, "slageet minya" means "blow me" in Russian. Yeah, I got that idea from Dean in Supernatural when he said it to Cas. I thought it'd be hot to have Dimitri say it in Russian so…hehe. Yeah I'm very immature. Hope you guys liked it :D**


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: This ch. is the morning-after sex, so yes, this ch. is rated MA as well. Be warned. There is sex in this one and I do not know how to write mild, tame sex so yeah…no bitching about morality. Enjoy the sex, picture yourself in Rose's position, and yep. All morals go out the window when you picture Dimitri doing that to YOU, believe me. LOL. Enjoy, guys. **

Feeling like I had thousand pound weights pressing against my eyelids with how utterly exhausted I was, I slowly but surely came to. Fighting with everything I had, I broke through wave after wave of unconsciousness that would come crashing down upon me, threatening to pull me down yet again.

With a sleepy sigh, I stirred in my sleep, struggling to force my eyes open. I was lying on my side and Dimitri's body was pressed up tightly against my back, one arm draped across my waist while the other one was lightly brushing my hair back from around my shoulder.

Like that, his lips were at the nape of my neck, softly calling out for me—his voice barely a whisper—hoping to rouse me to consciousness. "Roza," he said softly, his tone almost challenging. His lips skimmed across the skin of my throat.

"Hmm…" was all he allowed me to mumble before smirking against my skin, his body tensing up in preparation.

With that, I jerked completely awake at the feel of him slowly easing his way into me, tightening his arms around me to make what he was about to do all the easier. I started at the feel of his thickness slowly penetrating its way into me. The softest of whimpers escaped my lips and that mere sound—no matter how small it was—was enough to urge him on, giving him the actual, physical _need_ to make sure I was just as affected by him as he was by me. Clutching me tightly by my shoulders and pulling me down to make it easier to enter me, he shoved his body hard against mine as he plunged himself the rest of the way into her until he was perfectly nestled inside of me.

"Oh, God…" I cried out, my voice cracking between the words and sounding so hoarse that I sounded like I was on the verge of getting laryngitis. "Exactly what the fuck…do you think you're doing?" I managed to choke out, rocking myself back against him in a natural response that I could, in no way, help.

"Trahatʹ vas," he spoke in Russian, keeping his tone nonchalant, though something told me the content was dirty. "vo vsem, chto nuzhno bytʹ trahal." he clarified, his voice a low, guttural growl by this point.

"Generally don't take it in the ass," I cried out, unable to help myself.

Burying his face in my shoulder and smirking again, he breathed a chuckle. "Yes, well…there's general. Then there's downright exceptional. This would be me ensuring that you get the latter that you so deserve…"

He broke off after that, focusing on the task at hand. And, before I could ask for further clarification on that, he somehow managed to shift us into the sitting position. A bitch to do, I would think, but he did manage it so that he was able to stay inside me.

I was sitting in his lap, between his legs, stifling a gasp at the feel of him squirming his way further inside me. He kept his arms wrapped tightly around me: one around my breasts—his forearm pressing hard against them as if that would somehow press _me _harder against him—and the other one around my stomach, his palm resting against the smooth, warm flesh of my stomach, which would automatically ripple in response to the softest of touches from him.

As he began thrusting himself inside me, I soon began throwing myself back against him, trembling in his arms as I did so. God, he eventually became so tight within me that it felt like he was about to actually break off inside of me. It was like trying to fit a Cadillac in a dog house, yet…_somehow_ we managed to make it work. And, my God, did it _so_ work.

While I have had my doubts about this particular sexual act in the past, I actually found myself unconsciously getting really into it. I threw myself more eagerly into the task at hand, reveling in the feel of him and how those lines of pain and pleasure would blur together, somehow creating the most intense pleasure I had ever felt. Initially, it hurt like hell, but at the same time, it was like nothing I had ever felt before. It was just so…God, there were no words for it. There were no words in any language that could ever accurately describe just how utterly phenomenal it was—no words that could ever do it justice.

Something about it just made it—all of it, everything—so incredible in the best of ways. God, I was completely obsessed with how it felt to have him inside of me…

…how it felt to have his body writhing and thrashing hard and fast against mine, how it felt to have him hold me in his arms, how it felt to have him pounding into me, his cock driving deeper and deeper into me, how it felt to have my inner walls closing tighter around his cock—so tightly around him that I felt fairly certain he would be locked forever inside of me—and more than anything, how it felt when his body tensed up beneath mine as his climax was reached, how it felt to have him come so strongly, so powerfully inside me…

God, there was not one thing about Dimitri that did not get to me. And, the truly amazing thing was that while the sex was indeed phenomenal—I mean, there was no way in hell it couldn't be with him—it was so much more than just that.

It was being close without needing actual, physical proximity. It was feeling something without needing to actually, physically _feel_ him. It was wanting and needing him on such a different level, wanting and needing him without actually, physically wanting and needing him. It was holding the world—the entire universe—in my hands by merely being in his arms. It was the realization and acceptance that he was my world, he was my very universe. It was the fact that nothing else could exist outside the two of us so long as we were here.

There was Dimitri, there was me, and there were the flaring flames of the already-raging fire that consumed us and completely took us over, incinerating the world around them and filling us with such passion and desire until there was absolutely nothing left. Nothing but us.

_Nothing._

It got to the point where we were both shaking so hard that we were struggling to remain sitting upright without toppling over.

One of my hands actually moved down, fisting around the sheets to ensure that we wouldn't. While that hand desperately clenched those sheets, my other arm wound around his neck at an awkward angle, considering he was behind me. But, I made it work. I tightened my arm around him, tilting my head back slightly towards him to look in his eyes—not that it did much good. My eyes flicked over to his and was met with a long, penetrating stare, the hunger and desire he felt for me burning into her. It was so strong, so powerful that it became too much for me to handle and me eyes immediately fluttered shut to make it easier.

I shifted myself, turning even more towards him, and reaching up to touch my lips lightly to his. His lips immediately parted and his hot breath flowed into my mouth, mingling with mine, making me feel even dizzier and headier than I was before. But, it was just that. He refused to let the kiss deepen. He would tease me and his tongue would dart out to briefly taste my lips, but it would never actually enter my mouth. My tongue actually went searching for his, twining around his and tugging as if to force it in my mouth, but at that point, he broke the almost-kiss.

Keeping my arm around his neck, I made a small sound of protest and—as if to remove the temptation—he buried his face in my shoulder. He touched his forehead lightly to the bare skin of my shoulder and slowly moved it along my shoulder up to the side of my neck and then back again.

All the while, he kept up with his thrusts, thrusting into me harder and faster until I knew he was nearing his second climax. Oh, God, he was so close. Any minute now, it was bound to explode within him—or rather, within me.

I threw myself harder against him, eager to feel his thrusts intensify within me, eager to feel his mind-shattering orgasm tearing its way through him and releasing into me, eager to have that feeling, to remember what it feels like to have that very orgasm gushing into me. I would actually thrust myself upward, sliding my body against his, before slamming myself back down into his lap so our hips would come crashing together.

It got to the point where anytime my body would slam against his, he would actually grunt in response, grunting at the brief pain he felt with the full impact of my body weight colliding with his. But, if anything, even that pain was nothing more, nothing less than a major hard-core turn-on for the both of us. So, it was only a matter of seconds now before that orgasm ripped its way through him.

I felt him tense up beneath me once again and I knew exactly what was about to happen. I prepared myself, readying myself for what I knew was to come. Unable to help myself, I found myself crying out at the feel of his cock spasming inside of her—spasming so hard that I feared it would split me in half. I could feel it—with how hard he was, with how tight I had become around him—the tight yet perfect fit of him felt like I was literally about to be torn in two.

It was like trying to restrain a lion by tying a rubber band around his head to keep his mouth shut—it proved to be completely pointless. That rubber band would be snapped long before you actually had it around even the tamest of lions.

Of course, in this particular case, I could not bring myself to give a crap about that rubber band snapping—as a matter of fact, I was counting on just that. I was eagerly anticipating just that. Oh, God, at this point I hoped I would be ripped in half—then I could feel like I had accomplished something.

Oh, God. Oh, God…here it was. My train of thought was cut off as his arms tightened around me, clutching me even closer to him, as his climax was reached, tearing its way through him and surging into me almost as if having a mind all its own, like it knew exactly where to go from here, what to do. And, it did.

I let out another involuntary cry. God, I really, really needed to learn to stop doing that, damn it; I couldn't let Dimitri know how much he was really getting to me. His orgasm began flowing into me, filling me up yet again.

Smirking against the skin of my bare shoulder, Dimitri brought the hand that was on my stomach down—dragging it along every inch of my skin until it finally reached between my legs. He waited for me to tense up in anticipation before he began just barely touching me at first, barely brushing the skin there with his palm.

His index finger dipped down even lower, splitting my lips apart and softly stroking me. Again. And again. And again. He continued on with this—continuing his thrusts, continuing his releasing into me—until he felt somewhat satisfied leaving it at that. And, then, growing more ambitious, he moved on to pinch my clit between his thumb and his index finger, rubbing it, twisting it, even going so far as to roll it between those fingers. From that point on, he continued on, switching back and forth from simply stroking me to intensely massaging and squeezing her clit until I was rubbed raw from it.

Even more to it, the arm that was around my breasts loosened up slightly and moved so that he could cup my breast—which was still sporting quite a few bruises and teeth marks from our last encounter—in the palm of his hand so that he could start fondling me while he was palming me.

While he did that, he decided to just go for it now and slid his fingers down further before thrusting them hard into my naturally already wet entrance. Oh, dear God…oh, God, this was too much. He thrust himself against me as he came hard and fast in my ass, thrusting his fingers deeper into my entrance—exploring absolutely everything I had to offer him while he was playing Dora the Sex Explorer here. Refusing to let it stop there, he continued on fondling my breasts, his hand working against my breasts—despite how tender they were, considering he had rubbed them raw again and again and again.

Feeling the need to do more myself, I waited until my climax was reached and I was once again overflowing, spilling out around his fingers. I couldn't help but be fascinated by the fact that the very result of my climax was running down his forearm in little rivulets against his skin—some of it even pouring down the inside of my legs once again.

Smirking at that—seeing my chance to get him now—I reached my free hand down and ran my palm against my inner thigh, moving it upward to wipe off some of my remains. Then, I brought it back up, reaching around so I could see what I was doing, and wiped it onto his face, smearing the most of it into his skin and even going over to his sideburns.

Before he knew what was happening, I was turning slightly around and tightly gripped his chin in the palm of my hand before jerking his head to the side. Then, I brought my parted lips up to his cheek and my tongue darted out. It lightly touched his cheek where my very remains began, dragging ever-so-slowly, tantalizingly, across his flesh up to his sideburns, where I sucked the rest of it off. Oh, dear God…something about this was just so exhilarating. Something about tasting myself on his skin made it so much better—it made it seem like we were very much one in a completely different sense, on a different level. When I finished with that, I rested the side of my forehead against his cheek, turning my head to the side as I gasped desperately for breath.

Not even giving me a chance to fully recover, his hand gently wrapped around my wrist, tugging my hand over towards his own mouth. Waiting until my eyes were on him so I could watch what he was doing, he returned my smirk before he began sucking off the rest of what was left on my fingers. One by one, in turn, he would take my fingers into his mouth and suck urgently—his tongue rolling along the length of my fingers, his teeth grazing my fingertips and tugging it even further into his mouth.

With that, I freed my hand from his grip and grabbed hold of his hand before bringing it back down to assist him in his previous task of fondling my breasts. Actually assisting him, by the way. My hand closed over his, my fingers twining with his, and I assisted him by pressing his hand even harder against my breast. I intensified the pressure of his hand working against me with each one. I was bound and determined, ensuring that he continued on—squeezing me, massaging me, and fondling every last of inch of me—until he made me cry uncle.

All the while, his fingers continued working hard and fast against me, thrusting harder and deeper into me—not stopping for anything. And, eager to rise to the challenge, I began rising up and down on his hips again, slamming my body so hard against his that you could actually hear the sound of our bodies hitting each other. The actual sound of my body colliding hard with his—again and again and again.

Clutching me even tighter against him, he assisted me in that very act, his hips snapping up to meet mine in that perfect rhythm once again, his hips synching themselves to match mine as if it was a second nature to him by now. I rocked against him harder and harder, searching for any way to be even an nth closer to him, despite the fact that I knew just how impossible that was. And, what was more, was the fact that while all this was going on…

…I was coming. Hot, hard, and fast. God, was I coming. I came and I came all over him, until we were both drenched in it and my sheets were dangerously close to being completely soaked through.

But, either way, both of us refused to stop. This was the test to see just how far we could push the other person before they would finally break. And, being the stubborn-natured people we both were, we refused to be the first to break. No matter what. So we fought it with absolutely everything we had.

At one point, he lurched forward and wound up biting my shoulder to squelch a scream. Digging his nails hard into my arms and dragging me even closer against him with that, he chuckled, but it sounded more like a low, guttural growl than anything else. He had an alarmingly frequent tendency to do that when he was having sex, I noticed. Not that I was complaining—if anything, it was just a huge freakin' turn-on, but still. It was quite amusing to listen to him, knowing that he was fighting with everything he had and it still proved to not be enough.

Not that I was doing much better for myself. But still, as far as I was concerned, this wasn't about me at the moment.

He chuckled against the bare skin of my shoulder before once again skimming his lips along my skin until it reached my ear. He captured my earlobe between his teeth and tugged on it gently before pressing a hard, passionate kiss to my ear.

"I love you, Roza," he choked out, his voice severely strained and breathless. "And, I'm sorry…" God, how the hell he had managed to say even that much without passing out with how breathless he was was beyond me. "I am so sorry," he added, once he felt confident enough that speaking the words wouldn't result in his falling unconscious. "For everything I put you through—whether or not it was my fault, I'm sorry."

"Oh, believe you me, you have more than made up for _all_ of it," was all I managed to gasp, not really capable of forming a mere thought right now, let alone an actual sentence.

He tightened his arms around me, but it felt more like an act of affection as opposed to sexual. Oh, it was definitely sexual, but it felt almost like he was hugging me close to him to prove his affection for me.

"I am not even close to making up for all of it," he contradicted, only the slightest hint of sorrow managing to seep its way into his words, considering his arousal was the dominant emotion here.

"Well, then what the hell are you waiting for?" I demanded. "Shut up and get back to work."

"Sex will not fix everything," he told me, even though he never did let up in his sexual actions, even through all of this.

"Ugh," I groaned. Partly at the implication of a later-needed "talk" in his words and partly at an incredibly skilled feat his fingers were accomplishing within me while his cock continued to accomplish a very much appreciated task of its own in its seemingly endless attempt to conquer my ass.

"Does this mean we're going to have to have a 'talk' later on?" I managed as much a coherent sentence as I was capable of at this moment.

"I'm afraid so," he answered regretfully. "But, until then, I have more important matters at hand here…"

And, with that, we both shut the hell up as he returned to what he was doing, slamming himself further into my very depths, increasing his thrusts into me. His fingers continued moving around inside me. They had been in me so long that I had no doubt they practically had me memorized by now. The exact shape and feel and existence of my inner walls, the feel of them contracting around his fingers—the exact feel of my orgasm bursting through me and around him.

Everything about me he had memorized—now it was just the issue of rememorizing it again and again and again. He continued exploring every inch of me as studiously as if this was some life-and-death matter and someone had a gun to his head, threatening to kill him if he didn't have every last inch of me ingrained within his very being.

And, I continued on, keeping up with my tasks, throwing myself against him and winding my arm even tighter around his neck. It was as if I was on the brink of death and he was the only person in the world that had the power to save me. No one else did—no one else could ever have what it took; they could never be enough. I realized that now and I accepted it as easily as I accepted the fact that the sky was blue or two plus two equals four. It was a long-known truth that could never be changed, no matter how much time has passed or will pass. It was set in stone long ago and that was that. Nothing more to be done about it…except to acknowledge it.

It didn't end until my body collapsed against his, my head lolling weakly against his shoulders, and his arms wrapping around me to hold me against him to be sure I wouldn't pass out or something. Both of us were so out of breath, it seriously was a wonder that we weren't hyperventilating or passing out or at the very least blue in the face. Our chests rose and fell rapidly with each forced, sharp breath we took, our bodies completely worn out from the ordeal they had put ourselves through.

I managed a small, delirious chuckle before grabbing hold of his forearms and tugging his arms even tighter around myself as I nestled further into him. "Oh, my God…" I gasped out. "I mean, just…God…"

"I know," Dimitri agreed, returning my chuckle.

Leaning forward to bury his face in my shoulder, he pressed a kiss to my shoulder before leaning the side of his head against my shoulder and turning his head so he could look at me. "Yebut, Roza…" he murmured in Russian, his voice was still quite breathless, his breathing labored. "…I had no idea you could throw down like that."

Slightly insulted, I readjusted herself so that I could turn around in his arms. He was still holding me, but now I was facing him. I rose up in his lap to make looking in his eyes all the easier.

"Hey! I should know how to throw down like that, comrade; you're the one that taught me, are you not? You should be proud of me."

"Oh, I am," he assured me, with a genuine smile—the first one I had seen on him since his return. "I just didn't realize that _that_, in particular, that having sex like that, was within your realm of capabilities."

Offering him a suggestive smirk, I wound my arms tightly around his neck and bit my bottom lip. "Oh, you, Dimitri…have no idea whatsoever…what I am really capable of," I accused, the underlying sexual tone of her voice turning him on, despite how utterly exhausted and worn out his body was.

"Mm, is _that_ right?" he challenged, though he sounded slightly skeptical—in a teasing way.

"Right it is," I murmured in his ear, before racing my hands down and shoving hard against his shoulders to throw him back against the bed again.

My palms pressed hard against his shoulders to keep him pinned in place on the bed and, digging my nails hard into his shoulders, I lurched forward and brought my lips to his in a crushing, ardent kiss.

Grunting in surprise, his hands immediately found their way around my back to clutch desperately at my shoulder blades. Arching himself upward to deepen the kiss, he breathed a small, "Roza…" into my mouth. He dragged his nails hard down my back—so hard that I'm pretty sure he drew blood, though neither one of us actually acknowledged it—with his desperate attempts to be even closer to me.

And, like that, my lips were on his again before he could say another word or call me on it or anything else for that matter. Despite my body's need to rest, my desire for Tristan overpowered it and I fought through that exhaustion and delirium, giving into what I had always wanted. Giving into what I would always, always want.

And, thus it began, our bodies moving together as one, our bodies twining together as if knowing no other reaction than this…fighting through our exhaustion with every ounce of strength we had to have sex for, like, the 5,000th time. And, we were only too eager to go another 5,000 more rounds.

As a matter of fact, as far as we were concerned, we could honestly stay here and have sex for the rest of forever. Because, in this very moment—in those muttered names, in those murmured "I love you-s", in those sighs, those gasps, those whimpers, those moans—lie the very world. The very universe. _Our_ very universe. And, as long as that was true, nothing else mattered.

**(Russian translations: ****"Trahat****ʹ**** vas. vo vsem, chto nuzhno byt****ʹ**** trahal."**—"Fucking you. In every way there is to be fucked."

"**Yebut, Roza…"**—"Fuck, Roza…")

**A/N: How many chapters I have left is up to you guys. I have gotten another request for another Dimitri POV—not in the original plan, but I am willing to compromise and do that if that is preferred. I could do the next chapter—the morning after conversation of "Was it a mistake?" in Rose's POV then do another chapter in Dimitri's POV or I could do the next chapter in Dimitri's POV and it'll be end there, with the possibility of a sequel. Keep in mind that Last Sacrifice is due out Tuesday so once you read the real thing, you might lose interest in the thing you had just to help hold you over. It is seriously up to you guys—if you want the next chapter in Rose's POV then another in Dimitri's, that's fine. I don't mind. But, if you just want it in Dimitri's POV so it can be over with and you can spend the next week(s) focusing on Last Sacrifice, that's fine too. Just let me know what you prefer and I'll go off of your responses. Thanks a lot and I love ya guys tons :D **


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: OK, now that Last Sacrifice is released, I am sure my fic has lost all its appeal for all of you. For those of you who have stuck with me up till now, though, I thank you so very much. I can't even begin to comprehend how frustrating it must have been with all my fucked-up hiatuses and stuff. LOL. Nonetheless, though, I am forever grateful for everything you all have given me—the confidence, the support, the gratitude, everything has just meant the world to me and I needed you to know that. So here's my 13****th**** and final chapter to this fic and, as per request, this will be in Dimitri's POV. I do have a one-shot Dimose fic coming soon, and maybe more to follow. I do want to write a sequel to this—perhaps, a post-LS fic—so be on the look-out for it and again, I thank you all for everything you have given me and so, so much more. I love you all so much. Enjoy. Look forward to hearing from all of you. :D**

**Dimitri's POV:**

The whole world came crashing down upon me, my breaking all over again, as my gaze locked on hers. As I knew what was to come. Forcibly keeping my expression blank as ever, I stared at her, preparing myself for the inevitable.

"I'm not here for me," I finally answered her unspoken question, my voice so quiet, it was a wonder she could hear it at all.

"Imagine that," she said, irritation and almost a sense of disgust lacing her words. "Then why are you here?" she demanded, when I said no more. "What, your last Rose-pain induced jerk-off session not sufficient enough for you? Gotta come get your kicks directly from the source?"

I ignored her comment, knowing no good would come from acknowledging it. "How are you feeling?" I asked, using the neutral tone one would during an interrogation.

"Haven't you and I already had this conversation?" she reminded me. Like I could ever forget. "If we go in any more circles here, Dimitri, I just might very well collapse from how dizzy this is all making me." Her voice was strained—she sounded so weary with desperation. Not desperation in the sense that she would try to get me back…but weary in the sense that she merely wanted all of this to be over.

"Rose." I chided, that neutrality taking on a harder edge. I tried to hide the sting those words triggered within me. The sting that that very desperation and utter hopelessness triggered within me.

"I already told you," she said, voice and expression completely devoid of all emotion. "I'm just fantastic. Really. Never been better."

"You could have died," I pointed out, my voice much harsher than I intended it to be. That realization, the realization that she was taking this so lightly and treating it like it didn't matter...it infuriated me. More than it probably should have, admittedly—considering the hell I had put her through…but it did. "You realize that, don't you? You were barely alive when I brought you back. It's a wonder you're alive at all with what those Strigoi did to you. Do you understand that?"

"Yes," she answered, voice cold. "I understand the concept of death quite well, Dimitri, thank you. No explanation needed."

"Well, clearly, you do," I argued. "Because you are treating it like it's all one big joke or something. Like your life is nothing."

"Well, maybe it is nothing," she suggested, as careless and insouciant about her own life as she always, always had been in the past.

I took a bold, almost dangerous step towards her, resisting the urge to reach out and touch her. "Do_ not _say that." I clenched my teeth. "_Ever._ That is not true, Rose."

"Isn't it?" she cried out. "Tell me, Dimitri, exactly what is my point to living now? Oh yes, for the pain of betrayal? For the endless suffering and constant hell you people are putting me through? You know what? I honestly thought I was doing the right thing. All along, everything I did, I was_ so _convinced I was doing the right thing. Sacrificing everything I had for something greater. Something far more worth it. For everything. No. I sacrificed everything for nothing. Everything I ever had, I sacrificed. For you. For them. For Lissa. For the greater good. For what's right. You tell me, Dimitri...doesn't feel so damn right now, does it? Because it sure as hell doesn't to me."

It hit me then. I should've seen it—should've seen it long before this. Why she was really doing this. Why she was saying all this. Rose didn't want to die, not really. She was Rose Hathaway: Rose Hathaway never went down without a fight. Not the Rose I knew, anyway. She'd rather fight till her last breath than lie down and die, no matter how bad the odds were. She didn't care about the risk to herself—she never had. That very passion still burned strongly within her, that very urge to this day still drove her to fight for what was right…I knew it did. Something like that could never just go away, not ever. Not with someone like her. That very passion, that burning within her…that was what had first made me—

I shook his head in disbelief, cutting off the dangerous direction my thoughts inevitably would've led me in. "Rose, don't lie to me. This has nothing to do with _them_ and you know it. This is about me, isn't it? And what I said?" I used my best bold, authoritative voice, the one I had always used as her instructor…the one I knew she would always answer to, no matter her thoughts or feelings towards the matter.

"Damn," she said, not even bothering to hide her sarcasm. "Nothing gets by you, huh?"

"Rose," I reprimanded, "you are being ridiculous. You can't be like this just because of me. You have to get over it and move on—"

She threw up her hands in an emphatic gesture. "_Oh_, my God!" she cried out. "Do not do that. Don't you _dare_ stand there and do that." She turned her glare back on me. "I will not listen to any more of this shit. Okay, I have had enough. I have just had enough and I am done. Just stop it. Stop doing this—don't talk to me like I'm some stupid—"

I reached forward and gripped her upper arms to restrain her, sensing that she was seconds away from lashing out and throwing punches. "Rose!" I nearly yelled her name, the only way to break through her tangent and snap her back to reality. "You need to calm down." I loosened my hold on her ever-so-slightly, tensed and on the ready to restrain her again just in case she did decide to start swinging.

"No, Dimitri, you need to stop taking the moral fucking high road for two seconds and just try to see what this is doing to me! What _you_ are doing to me! You can't see it; you never could. You are so fucking blind to anything that isn't comprised of guilt and remorse and self-loathing, aren't you?"

I shook my head again, this time in my misery. "You have no right—"

"No, _you_ have no damn right!" she shot back, not even allowing me to finish my sentence. "You can talk big all you want, Dimitri, give all these shit-ass speeches about how you're doing the right thing, how you're making up for your past grievances…but in reality, you are doing nothing. Nothing but making a horrible situation that much worse. You are making nothing better with this, you realize that, don't you?"

"Yes, I realize that," I said softly, the agony of those words piercing me through to my core. The agony of what I have done and what I could never again put right. "Which is why I have to do this, why I have no choice but to stay away from you for both our sakes."

"Don't you give me this damn speech, not again, you bastard." Her voice was fire and ice at the same time, so strange and uncharacteristic, I couldn't even recognize it. I wouldn't have known it was her speaking had I not been here looking her in the eye right this second.

"Dimitri, now it's your turn for honesty. I humored you, now it's your turn to humor me. _Do not lie to me." _The boldness, the intensity with which she spoke those words actually sent chills down my spine. Something that I never thought she could bring about in me, not like this anyway.

"You know it won't help," she pointed out, "you know I'll see right through it. If roles were reversed, if this had happened to you…if I had been turned Strigoi and you had to hunt me down and try so desperately to kill me when in all reality that was the last thing you wanted to do, when the mere thought of driving that stake through my heart shattered yours to pieces…then through some ridiculous impossible miracle, I'm dhampir me again and after months—_months_—of separation, you have me back.

"And I push you away. I want nothing more to do with you. You give up…everything and everyone you have ever loved to save me—going through a hell that makes hell itself seem like the greatest of heavenly dimensions—and nothing. I refuse to even acknowledge your existence, much less express the much deserved gratitude. How would you feel? What would you do? How would you feel if I was turned into a Strigoi then I came…" she cut herself off, unable to go on. "How. Would. You. Feel?"

I considered that. I honestly and truly tried to contemplate what she went through for me. The hell she willingly endured for my sake, all for the sake of bringing me back, no matter how impossible or preposterous the idea had seemed. If roles were reversed, had I been the one to track her down and have a hand in saving her only to have her come back and tear herself away from me once again…

I couldn't lie to her. Not just because she could tell if I lied to her, but because I could not bring myself to lie to her. "I'd feel like killing myself," I spoke the words, in all honesty, a tremulous note to my voice.

Narrowing her eyes at me, she nodded her head angrily in understanding. I watched that anger and spirit-induced insanity and blackness truly, once and for all, take her over. It engulfed and consumed her entirely. Looking at her…she was no longer Rose Hathaway. She was no longer the woman that I…I was staring at a complete stranger.

She breathed the smallest of chuckles and spoke her next words in the coldest of tones: "You'd feel like killing yourself," she repeated my words quietly, almost as if to herself. Her next words, she directed to me, the words cutting into me like a blade all on their own. "Then, please, by all means…give me _one_ good reason…why I shouldn't take a fucking blade to my wrists and end my own life _right_ now."

A sudden gasp of terror and a jolt back to reality make me jerk upright in bed. I lurched forward, some distant part of me realizing that gasp of terror had come from me. Trembling with that terror, my chest rose and fell rapidly with my labored breathing, a cold sweat coating my skin.

Frantically—instinctively—my eyes roamed about the dark room, desperately searching for danger—for any sign of a danger that I could get my hands on. It didn't take long for my eyes to adjust to the darkness, and it took even less time for Rose to lurch up right beside me, concern and fear etched into her features.

"Dimitri," she cried out. "Dimitri, it's okay. It's okay. I'm here, I'm here." One her hands tugged desperately on my arm in her attempts to get my attention, while her other hand reached out to grab a hold of my face to turn it towards her so she could see me better.

Her eyes met mine and, in that moment, everything came rushing back to me. Memories of everything that had happened between us, up until falling asleep together in each other's arms after having had sex again. Had I imagined that? Had I been dreaming? No. No, her naked form curled up beside me confirmed just as much. Even under such distress, I couldn't help but appreciate just what she had to offer me in all her glory.

"Rose," I breathed, not trusting myself to say anything more. I took her in, my eyes looking her up and down, scanning her for injury. I expected her to disappear—I kept waiting for her to just vanish…to blink and find her gone. Or worse.

"Dimitri," she repeated. "What happened? What's wrong?"

_Then, please, by all means,_ I heard her voice once again, ringing in my ears. _…give me_ one _good reason…why I shouldn't take a fucking blade to my wrists and end my own life_ right_ now._

Once again, I had the sensation of those words acting as a blade on their own, piercing me through and through. "Roza," I murmured, and before I realized what I was doing or could bring myself to stop it, I threw myself into her arms. "Roza…" I wrapped her in my embrace, burying my face miserably in her shoulder as she closed the distance between us. "Roza, no…"

And, with that, I fell silent, saying or doing nothing more than just holding her in my arms. Tightening her hold on me, she softly shushed me, whispering reassuring words of comfort to me.

After a long moment, she finally released me, that gaze burning strongly between us as she asked, "What happened? Are you okay?"

Exhaling shakily, I shook my head slightly, almost afraid to speak the words out loud. If I spoke them out loud, I feared that would make it true.

"Hey." She reached out again to touch my face, this time, brushing my hair behind my ears, and offering me a small, reassuring smile. "You can tell me. It's okay."

"No," I countered. "It's not…" With that, I relayed the dream to her, telling her exactly everything that happened…every word that was spoken between us, everything, ending with her threatening to kill herself.

"Well," she began when I finished, "you kinda brought this upon yourself, wouldn't you say? I told you continuing to avoid me was a bad idea, did I not? Karma's comin' to collect, I suppose."

"Rose," I reprimanded. I was appalled—I could not believe she would actually be making a joke right now. "That is not funny. What is the matter with you? How can you talk like this?"

"Relax, comrade," she said, with a sigh. She held up a hand to stop me. "I'm not contemplating suicide or anything. I'm just saying that poetic justice is…well, poetic. I can appreciate that. You got to see my side in this for once, get a taste of that oh, so bitter medicine you practically shoved down my throat."

I opened my mouth to protest, but she cut me off, seeing where I was going with this. "All right, sorry. Sorry. Sarcasm is obviously not the best way to go right now, I get that. Look at me," she said unnecessarily, since I already was. "That will never be you and me, understand? I would never, never dream of putting you through that. Was I upset for what you put me through, yes. I was. But I'm over it. No matter what happens, I will never…" she broke off, clearly at a loss for words. It clearly bothered her that she didn't know what to say or where to go from here…but I found it rather endearing. "I am not the Anna to your Lucas," she said finally.

"Aren't you?" I challenged. "Think about it, Rose. The similarities between us—"

"—are just that," she finished for me. "Similarities. Nothing more. Believe me…I have worried on more than one occasion that I might just give in and do it…just to make it all stop. To make all the pain go away. The pain of losing you. The pain of losing Lissa. But now I know more than anything that that very loss has made me all the stronger. I've lost you both and I made it through. It hurt like hell and God, how I so wanted to die. But I didn't. I couldn't. Because, apparently, Rose Hathaway is too strong and too badass to be taken down by such matters. "

I chuckled softly at her confidence, but even so, it was strained. "Naturally," I teased.

"No," she contradicted. "Very, very unnaturally," she clarified. "I have…no idea how I made it through. And honestly, I did have those days…where suicide—" she shuddered. "…seemed to be my only option. The only way out. But, I pushed past it. I fought my way through it—I fought, I fought like hell."

"I'm glad you did," I told her, clasping her hand in mine and giving it a gentle squeeze.

"And, I always will," she reassured me, squeezing back. "I know that I used to be worried about it…I feared that one day I might give in. But now I know that I never will. Nothing will ever be enough to send me over that edge. Not you, not Lissa…not even spirit."

Something told me her words sounded much more confident than she actually was, though she did an amazing job hiding any doubt she might have felt. Still, I nodded, trying to give her the benefit of the doubt, trying to believe in her and her strength as much as she did.

"Honestly, if it wasn't for you," she continued, oblivious to _my_ doubt. "…if it wasn't for you and the strength you gave me that night when spirit threatened to consume me. When you told me I was stronger than it and you wouldn't let me give in…that was when I felt the strongest against it. That was when I knew I could win. That it was inevitable. And now, with you by my side…here again…it is inevitable. There is no way I can't win against it. That much, I know."

"Even if I…break up with you again?" I spoke the words carefully, exercising great caution since this wasn't something either of us had really discussed or reconciled quite yet.

"Are you saying…are you saying we can be together again?" she said, seeming to exercise that very caution in her words.

"Kind of inevitable now, wouldn't you say?" I tried my hand at a joke, as my lips tugged up into a small smirk.

"That I would," she agreed. "And no. Even if you did break up with me again, I wouldn't kill myself." Relief flooded me, my features taking on a whole new countenance judging by the look on her face. "Nah, I'd just go after you," she assured me. "Things get bad enough, I am not above resorting to cutting off valuables in your sleep, just FYI," she warned.

Unexpectedly, that made me laugh. "I'll keep that in mind. You just have to…just promise me that no matter what, you won't give in. You'll keep up the good fight."

"Haven't I always?" she pointed out.

"Yes," I conceded. "But things haven't gotten as bad as they could've been."

Shock distorted her features as she stared at me, gaping. "Dimitri…I've lost you. I've lost Lissa. That's pretty much everything I've ever had to lose. No. It couldn't get any worse than that. Believe me."

"I want to," I said miserably, averting my eyes in my shame.

"Hey," she sounded insulted. "Are you doubting me and my awesome, badass strength?"

"No," I said quietly, having to force my gaze to meet hers with my next words. "I'm doubting mine. And whether or not I would be okay if you did…if I would make it through if I ever lost you again."

She gave me a look that she implied the mere concept of my words was just beyond ridiculous. "Well, considering about ¾ of my strength came from you and what you taught me, I'd wager to say yeah. Yeah, that it'd be enough. You'd be fine, Dimitri, I know you would."

"Actually," he corrected, "more like 4/5 of your strength would've come from me. By my estimation, anyways, you were pretty…unbalanced when we first started those training sessions."

"Meh," she said, with a dismissive wave of her free hand. "Technicalities. Either way, whatever. Point is, you are much, much stronger than me and if I could handle losing you, losing me would be cake for you."

"I'd hardly call it cake, Rose."

"You prefer pie?" she offered.

"No, I prefer neither. I prefer keeping both my pie and my cake, if I could."

"And you will," she said, drawing me once more into her embrace. "I'm not going anywhere. You, comrade…are stuck with me. Whether you like it or not."

Offering her a small smile, I managed to say, "I can get on board with that," before our lips met once more, cutting off any other words I might've added to it.

After a long moment, I broke the kiss, tilting my head slightly to press a kiss gently to her forehead. Then I whispered the words, "I am so sorry," against her skin. "For everything," I added, turning my head to the side slightly and resting the side of my head against her forehead.

"All is forgiven," she assured me, as her hands slowly began tracing the shape of my arms. Up and down, her hands moved along the length of my arms, pulling them around her waist and wrapping herself against me once more.

She never did actually kiss me again—she just continued running her hands along my bare flesh, pressing herself closer and closer to me as she did so. I was perfectly content to simply let her do this, watching her every movement, every expression that crossed her face.

"There's no need to…" she began again, after such a long moment of silence that her voice actually startled me. I flinched from it, earning a small smile from her. "I love you," she said softly.

Then, as if to prove her point, she shifted herself to her knees and climbed into my lap. Winding her arms tightly around my neck, she used that as leverage to shift herself up to make it easier to press herself completely against me. There was not one inch of her skin that was not connected with mine.

"Nothing will ever change that," she promised me. "And it is because of that love that I could never do that to you. Whether or not you're still around, my love for you is…and that is what won't let me go through with it. Not ever."

The smile on my lips came much more naturally this time. "That's good to know. Thank you." She pressed her lips lightly against mine again in response. "So…" I continued, "where exactly do we go from here?"

I felt her shrug in the dark. "Anywhere you want to go…anywhere they send us. Just…anywhere. I really couldn't care less."

"I hardly meant place-wise, Rose," I said, trying to hide the smirk on my face. "I meant in life. With us. You and me. Where do we go from here? I know where I want to go, but in the end…well, it's up to you."

"No," she countered. "It's up to us, you said it yourself. And, I get what you meant, I just…that was my way of answering you."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that so long as you're nearby inasmuch as you can be and we're together inasmuch as we can be…I'm up for anything."

Hmm. Speaking of…

"I don't know about you," she said, and even I could hear the wry sense of knowing in her voice, "but I know I am most definitely up for another round or two in the bedroom. You know, before we have to face the reality of a life outside of sex. God, how depressing."

I chuckled. "Take it you are too?" she asked, tilting her head so she could look me in the eyes all the easier. Even as she said the words, her hands traced ever-so-slowly down, running down my chest…down my stomach…down, down…

A funny sound—almost like a half-moan, half-whimper—caught in the back of my throat. "Oh, up, I most definitely am," I murmured, as my head lolled forward and came to rest in the crook of her neck. "Up as I ever can be."

"Mm, I'm fully aware of that, believe you me," she said, a smile in her voice, as she shifted herself so that she was hovering directly above me—by which, I mean _me_.

"You are dangerously on the verge of giving me a priapism, I hope you know," I mumbled, the words barely coherent, though I knew she understood them perfectly. "…the good kind, though," I assured her. "…the kind that any man worth his salt would willingly sell his soul and much more for."

"Hmm…" she chuckled softly. "Well you hardly have to sell your soul, I guarantee you. There's no need for that. I mean, hello, it's you. You don't owe me a damn thing," she assured me. All the while, she managed to focus the rest of her energy on slowly easing me—just barely—into her already so wet entrance. So wet in fact, that I glided so easily the rest of the way in, so easily that every inch of me was inside her, every inch of me in its entirety…

Another moan escaped my lips as I repositioned us, ever-so-carefully stretching us out, laying her back against the bed and stretching out across the length of her. "Too bad," I practically growled the words, as my arousal consumed me and there was room for little else in my mind. "Because due or not, Roza…consider me sold. At least to you, anyway."

A moan now escaped her lips, the only outward sign that I was getting to her and affecting her at all like she was affecting me. "Mm, now that I can most certainly get on board with."

Any words she might've added to that were smothered off as I brought my lips to hers once again. Tilting her head back, she arched herself upward to deepen the kiss all the more. The kissing grew in intensity, one kissing melting into another and another…

…the rest of the world soon crumbled away, nothing else existing outside the two of us. The world—the universe—was comprised of her and me. There could be nothing else outside of us and the love and passion that filled and consumed us entirely…

I was taking nothing for granted anymore—least of all, her—and I was going to live life to its very fullest…starting with opening myself up to that very love we had lost and allowing it flood me and become me.

With that very consumption, I knew—more than I've ever known anything else—that everything would be okay. No matter what, eventually everything would be okay. No matter how bad things might get, no matter what might come our way, so long as I had Rose with me, everything would be better than okay. It was inevitable—there was no other option.

Between the two of us, there was nothing we could not take on—nothing that we could not handle. I felt such a sense of peace, such a sense of all being right with the world from that thought, and I knew that very sense filled her too.

"I love you, Roza" I whispered, as my lips trailed down, down the warm, smooth flesh of her exposed throat. "Roza," I repeated, pressing my lips into the hollow of her throat, before trailing them in a perfect line down her chest.

"And I love you," she assured me, arching herself even closer to me, so close it was if she was searching desperately for a way to weld our bodies together.

_Love_, I realized. It was that very love for her that gave me everything. So long as that was true, I could never be unhappy. No, all the happiness of the world rested entirely in her…and I was here, ready to collect. To collect what would be mine so long as she would deem me worthy of it.

THE END.

**A/N: All right…*groans* I feel just horrible. I am so, so, SO sorry, you guys; I really feel like I kinda half-assed that chapter. I honestly didn't mean to, but with LS already being out I guess I kinda felt like my interpretation of it was pointless so I did what I could but had a nagging voice in my head saying: "What the fuck are you doing, you moron? You're really trying to pull this off?" LOL. I'm sorry if this didn't add up to any of your expectations or if I let anyone down. BUT I do have another Dimose one-shot fic coming soon, then another one—a post-LS fic—coming right after that. Unfortunately, it might take a while. For those of you who don't know, I have actually written a book and I'm actually taking a semester off of school to focus primarily on editing it inasmuch as I can and doing everything in my power to getting it out to publishers/editors/agents, etc. etc. so that will be my main focus. In the meantime, I will write as much as I can and try to keep up with my fics and have something new and interesting posted as much as I can, but please bear with me. You guys have been absolutely beyond phenomenal and it is BECAUSE of you and your support that I have decided to take such a huge risk with my life and drop everything to pursue this slim, near-impossible chance of getting my work published. Thank you all again, keep a look-out for more of my work, do not give up, I am not going anywhere, and wish me luck. I need it :D**


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